The McKinsey Quarterly recently published a useful report, Crafting a message that sticks: An interview with Chip Heath. Chip is a professor of organizational behavior in Stanford University’s Graduate School of Businses who has been studying what makes for effective messages. These principles can certainly be applied to blogs. Go to the McKinsey report for all the details. Here are the highlights in six basic ideas. I slightly condensed their words. The points are useful but I am afraid they violate the second point. I did not see any surprises here but they are good reminders and reminders are useful, at least to me.
Simplicity. Messages are most memorable if they are short and deep. Sound bites are short, but don’t last. Proverbs such as the golden rule are short but also deep enough to guide the behavior of people over generations.
Unexpectedness. Something sounding like common sense won’t stick if people heard it before. Look for the parts of your message that are uncommon sense. Such messages generate interest and curiosity.
Concreteness. Abstract language and ideas don’t leave sensory impressions; concrete images do. Compare “get an American on the moon in this decade” with “seize leadership in the space race through targeted technology initiatives and enhanced team-based routines.”
Credibility. Can a case be made for the message or is it a confabulation of spin? Very often, a person trying to convey a message cites outside experts when the most credible source is the person listening to the message. Questions—“Have you experienced this?”—are often more credible than outside experts.
Emotions. Case studies that involve people also move them. “We are wired,” Heath writes, “to feel things for people, not abstractions."
Stories. We all tell stories every day. Why? “Research shows that mentally rehearsing a situation helps us perform better when we encounter that situation,” Heath writes. “Stories act as a kind of mental flight simulator, preparing us to respond more quickly and effectively.”
I would add that stories are easy to remember and can make abstract ideas concrete. See this series, Storytelling and Knowledge Management: A Serial in Six Parts.
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