Rachel Lehmann-Haupt on designing the voice of a brand

Rachel Lehman-Haupt is an award-winning science writer, author, and founder of StoryMade Studio. StoryMade Studio works as a thought partner with companies and individuals to craft master brand narratives and amplify their stories through digital strategy with the goals of raising money, or launching a brand, product or idea into the world.  Storymade’s areas of expertise are women’s advocacy and health, with a particular emphasis on writing that humanizes science and technology. Lehmann-Haupt has been a media advisor for technology start-ups, media properties, and nonprofits, including TED, where she was a founding editor of TED Books, Dwell Magazine, Conde Naste Health, Baby Center, Code for America, Bridge Housing, Ornish Lifestyle Medicine, Neo.Life, Equity Office,  UCSF Benioff’s Children’s Hospital, Future Family, and The Mayo Clinic.

As the author of two books,  In Her Own Sweet Time: Egg Freezing and the New Frontiers of Family (Basic Books) and the forthcoming Reconceptions: Modern Relationships, Reproductive Science and the Unfolding Future of Family (BenBella Books, Feb, 2023), she has influenced thousands of women who are searching for the best ways to balance their desires for a career and family. Her writing has been featured in the New York Times, the New York Observer, Newsweek, Slate, New York, Vogue, Outside, Wired, Business Week, and Neo.Life. She has been profiled by The Chicago Tribune and appeared on Good Morning America, Wall Street Journal’s Lunch Break, and Bay Area Focus.

SHACK15: Can you tell us about your background as a writer?

Lehman-Haupt: Some people think storytelling is genetic, and others consider it a learned skill.  In my case, I think it’s both. I grew up in a family of storytellers who go back generations. My dad was the senior daily book reviewer for the New York Times for over three decades. My mom is a poet and author of eight books. My grandfather was a professor of bibliography and curator of rare books at Columbia University, and is the author of a book called The Life of the Book, which I recently wrote about for the StoryMade blog. Stories were the way we communicated around our family dinner table.

In college, I studied English literature and then went to graduate school at UC Berkeley’s Graduate School of Journalism, where I focused on video, digital, and print media, and apprenticed with Clay Felker, who was a famous editor of many of the leading new journalists of his era like Gail Sheehy, Joan Didion, and Tom Wolfe. After school, I joined the editorial team at the newly launched Wired magazine, and then I moved back to New York to begin a career writing and editing at magazines, mostly about the intersection of science, technology, and culture, a point of view I gained from working at Wired. The idea for my first book, In Her Own Sweet Time: Egg Freezing and the New Frontiers of Family, arose from the perspective that science and technological innovations drive cultural change. The book is about how women are delaying motherhood and leaning on reproductive technologies like egg freezing and IVF to support building their families.

SHACK15: What inspired the move from NYC to SF, and what impact did that have on your career as a journalist?

Lehman-Haupt: Around 2010, I had just published my first book. I was still writing for magazines, but increasingly my work was published digitally - I produced a multimedia video column for MSN and was writing science stories for CBS Interactive. I started to see all the innovations in the biotech and healthcare in the Bay Area and felt like it was the future. I decided to move back here because I’ve always been inspired by Northern California’s counterculture of DIY artists, technology, and scientific pioneers whose restlessness and vision have sparked so many culture-shifting innovations. I also wanted to fulfill a dream of living in the Sausalito houseboat community, a place where so many cultural disrupters have lived. Around the same time, a boss of mine from Wired magazine told me that he was launching a new books division of the TED Conference. It was the same year that Apple had launched the iPad, and he asked me to help him build an app that would distribute multimedia books based on TED talks that people could access through a subscription. These “books” became multimedia stories that integrated audio, the TED talk, and a written story that was a deeper dive into the material of the TED talk. I began working with TED speakers, many of whom were scientists and business innovators, on producing these books based on their ideas. One of my most exciting projects was working with the filmmaker Tiffany Shlain (Shack 15’s artist-in-residence) member) on reverse-engineering her film Brain Power: From Neurons to Networks into a TED book. 

SHACK15: Tell us a little more about StoryMade. When did you launch the company, and what type of clients do you cater to?

Lehman-Haupt: While working with TED, I started to see that many people and brands wanted to become digital thought leaders to get their ideas, products, and services into the world in different media formats, from books to videos to digital magazines, newsletters, apps, and even live events. All of these formats required the same storytelling approach, so my company, StoryMade Studio, evolved out of that role at TED as an editor and producer.  I began working with many individuals and brands, helping them conceive and launch media projects and put together the right team to develop content, including creating master thought leadership narratives, blogs and newsletters, books, videos, managing editorial calendars, and developing social media campaigns.  The origin of the name is from my family background; a lot of my identity was literally made and shaped by the storytellers around me. 

StoryMade focuses on bioscience and health, including women’s health and gender politics, environmental health, and sustainability design. This stems from my background as a science writer. With every client, I offer a very bespoke strategy service as their storytelling thought partner, and with others, that relationship grows into building teams of writers, editors, designers, and producers that are the best to amplify their story out into the world.

SHACK15: Why has storytelling become so important for companies and thought leaders? 

Lehman-Haupt: Most magazines and media brands have now migrated online, but you don’t necessarily need to be attached to a brand to have an identity online.  You or the company you run can launch your own media brand, which has opened up a whole new storytelling approach, often called brand storytelling. Because we engage with ideas and brands through digital experiences, consumers now crave a human connection. That connection is a story that goes beyond demographics and actually dives into people’s attitudes and behaviors, or what’s known as their psychographics.  It’s different from traditional advertising or public relations, which is selling a product, service or story. Brand stories are told through pitch decks, articles, podcasts, videos, social media, or books that represent and bring to life the values and perspective of the different people in your audience. Designing the voice of a brand is now as important as crafting a marketing strategy in the traditional sense because it helps a company find its tribe - the people who are part of its story. 

Our brains are literally wired to remember stories than data, facts, and figures because stories literally make the brain slow down and listen. The writer Joan Didion once wrote that she writes to find out what she’s thinking. Ultimately, stories are how our brains make sense of the world. Science studies have found that storytelling fosters cooperation and even releases oxytocin,  a neurohormone associated with empathy, and a vital element in the building, deepening, and maintaining of relationships. So whether you're thinking about writing a book, or you’re starting a company, crafting a pitch, or ready to create your thought leadership narrative platform, which will become the foundation of all stories you tell, StoryMade can help. 

SHACK15: What are you looking to get out of your experience as a new member at SHACK15?

Lehman-Haupt: Co-creators,  new friends, and to spark action for change. After the pandemic, I think we’re all looking to shake the snow globe to rebuild community. I’m particularly focused on ways to support public health and women’s advocacy.   

SHACK15: What are some exciting projects you’re currently working on?

Lehman-Haupt: I'm currently working with the Mayo Clinic on a women's health content project. I’m also working with a doctor who owns a farm on a book about how regenerative farming and plant-based eating can improve our personal health and the health of the planet. I’m writing for Jane Metcalfe’s Neo.Life. Many of the stories I have written for Neo.Life are part of my second book, Reconceptions: Modern Relationships, Reproductive Science and the Unfolding Future of Family, which will be published in February 2023. I am also excited to see what unfolds from all the new connections I am making at SHACK15. The possibilities are endless.