Why can you remember the details of some things and others just pass through your brain and not even slow down?

If you must follow that dictum of advertising to repeat your message ad nasum then your message was not memorable. Reformulate your message to stick in the minds of those you try to reach. The book Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die by brothers Chip and Dan Heath outlines how to make an idea stick in the mind of the intended audience.

They begin the book with an urban legend about a guy waking up in an ice filled bathtub sans one kidney. Why can you hear this story and repeat it yet not remember the key message from your meeting yesterday or the brand message a company has spent thousands of dollars to communicate to you?

The urban legend has what the brother’s Heath outline as the critical elements of a sticky idea.
1. Simplicity
2. Unexpectedness
3. Concreteness
4. Credibility
5. Emotions
6. Stories

Do you want your potential customers to remember your marketing efforts? Then be sure every communication has these key elements. Sticky ideas are easily understood and remembered. Heath and Heath implore you to become a master of exclusion: If you say three things you have said nothing. Hone in on one key message and make it stick.

E-mail this entry to a friend