Make Your Points Stick
How many times have you met someone in a meeting or at a party and forgotten their name before they've finished introducing themselves. Sometimes it's you, but sometimes it's them – it's easier to point the finger of course; these forgotten people haven't made their message stick. Now before you get too high and mighty, consider how many people have forgotten you while you were still talking.
So how do you make your message stick? First off, let's be clear what we mean by message here. A message is anything you direct at an audience. That covers a wide swath from the speech you deliver at the industry dinner to the enraged email you send your supplier to the hearty huzzah handshake you give your top salesperson to the directive you give your kids to brush their teeth. Those are all messages. And though it would be nice, making your message stick isn't just a matter of firing up the glue gun.
Fortunately, others with know how have given this sticking thing some thought including the reliably astute Michael Stelzner of Writing White Papers. In a recent post, he nicely summarized a strategy for sticky messages that he discovered in MarketingProf's "Get to the Point" newsletter. The six point plan goes by the clever acronym S.U.C.C.E.S.
- S: Simplicity
- U: Unexpectedness
- C: Concreteness
- C: Credibility
- E: Emotion
- S: Stories
Click through to the full text of Michael's Making Your Message Stick posting to read the fine print of each of the six points and start adding adhesive to your messages.
