“Stories are the best vehicles to take your brand straight to people’s hearts.”
-Shlomi Ron
The Backstory
Pay attention to your side hustles. Sometimes that’s where your BIG STORY is waiting!
Hi, I’m Shlomi Ron, CEO of the Visual Storytelling Institute, based in Miami, FL. We help brands better connect with their audiences through visual storytelling consulting, training, and thought leadership.
Over twenty years, I worked in various digital marketing roles on the agency and largely on the brand side, with Fortune 100/500 brands such as IBM, Nokia, and American Express.
All along, I was nursing my side passion for visual stories with interests in classic Italian cinema ,writing film reviews and curating film festivals, and managing the estate of video art pioneer, Buky Schwartz.
Along the journey, I kept wondering: How can businesses rise above the growing information overload – that costs the US economy over $900 billion a year – riding on such decreasing attention spans?
Therefore, with my combined experience in marketing, and my passion for visual stories I started the Visual Storytelling Institute (VSI)– the primary think tank that brings the gospel of visual storytelling from the world of art into a more human and purposeful marketing.
I am a nascent bread baker, The Moth fan, and longtime fedora wearer likely to jive with my classic Italian cinema interest.
Our Audience
Since 65% of us our visual learners, I believe people respond better when they can see their problem mirrored in a personally relevant visual story.
At VSI, I help business leaders at mid to enterprise level organizations:
– CMOs and VPs of Corporate Training & Development interested in empowering their teams with custom visual storytelling workshops to drive a stronger customer engagement and growth.
– University marketing chairs and directors of training organizations who are looking to revamp their curriculums with visual storytelling courses.
– VPs of Customer Experience, and founders interested in bringing to life their brand experiences with VSI’s consulting with a full stack production studio featuring: animated videos, visual journeys, presentations, AI-based videos, and interactive experiences.
We have provided training, production, and consulting for La Mer, Microsoft, RTI International, Cable & Wireless, Pearson Education, and University of Miami – to name a few.
Spreading the Word
Our thought leadership programs cover multiple channels: VSI Blog, public talks, published the book: Total Acuity: Tales with Marketing Morals to Help You Create Richer Visual Brand Stories. and the Visual Storytelling Today podcast (ranks in the top 1o business storytelling podcasts on the Web) – have all placed VSI at the #1 position on all search engines. For brand partnership opportunities, check our Media Kit.
And to train future marketers, these days, I also teach the first Brand Storytelling course at the University of Miami’s Business School.
What makes a good story? I always say:
“The magic happens the moment your brand story mirrors your customer’s personal story.”
What we Do
The Visual Storytelling Institute (VSI) is the primary think tank that brings the gospel of visual storytelling from the world of art into marketing. We help forward-thinking business leaders who want to rise above the communication noise – that costs the U.S. economy $900 billion a year – with an artistic approach to connect better with their audiences and grow their companies faster.
Our core services include:
The Power of Visual Storytelling
Innate effectiveness of visual content
Visuals are processed 60,000 times faster
than text by the human brain and
90% of information transmitted to the brain is visual
(source: 3M).
The rise of the``Visual Web``
71% of users are now accessing social
media from a mobile device, which unleashes
massive content production and consumption
(source: Adobe).
People respond better to visual content
Viewers are 85% more likely to
purchase a product after
watching a product video.
(source: Internet Retailer).