Jason Bourne on a Jetski is More Interesting Than Bruce Wayne in a Tuba

Think about ordering pizza and having it come to your house.  Not a big deal, right?  But what if that pizza was delivered in a Ferrari?  Suddenly it’s a memorable experience.

Recently someone on Twitter posed the question: What happens when you write what you think is an amazing blog post, and it falls flat. No one comments, no one shares, and it’s doubly frustrating because this was a post that you loved, and you thought others would love it as well.  This post was about a thing or a person or an idea that you are passionate about, and you wanted to share that passion with the world.

And it fell flat as a pancake.  The proverbial digital tree falling in the digital forest and no one heard it.

The question becomes, ok now what?

Whenever a piece of content doesn’t resonate as I thought it would, I ask myself “What is the core idea here that excited me, and why doesn’t it excite others as well?”  This forces me to re-evaluate the idea, question if it is really important, and also examine how I can frame the idea so that others can see its importance.

I’ve written before about the value of empathy in your marketing and really all your communications. In this context, empathy means seeing your content as your audience would see it. How will you frame your ideas so they are interesting and relevant for your audience?

When I was working on the book that would become Think Like a Rock Star, I had a core idea that was interesting and relevant that I wanted to share with the world. I saw how some brands had customers that literally LOVED that brand, and I wanted other brands to understand the power of creating and cultivating powerful advocates. But the reality is that most brands don’t have a core base of passionate customers, so it’s hard for those brands to relate to this idea and see the potential.

So I took my core idea and wrapped in the rock star analogy. While most brands couldn’t envision what it would be like to have passionate customers, they COULD relate to how a rock star has fans, They could understand how fans drive success for that rock star. So I started with the rock star frame of reference, that brands saw the value in, and worked backwards to relate the analogy to their brand.  The majority of the book is written to help brands understand how their customers can be converted into fans just like a rock star has fans. By presenting the idea in this way by using the rock star analogy, it immediately becomes more interesting and relevant to brands.

So when you are trying to frame or even reframe your idea for your audience, ask yourself these questions:

1 – Who is my audience for this idea?

2 – What impact or change will this idea make for my audience?

3 – How can I take my idea and make it relevant to my audience.

I think the third question is the hardest to answer as we’ve just discussed. The trap many of us fall into is believing that everyone else will love our idea for the same reasons we do. Nothing could be further from the truth. Understanding the point of view of your audience and having empathy for their reality are keys to creating an idea that connects with your audience,