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Presentation to Confab 2013 by Melissa Rach, Dialog Studios The secret’s out: Content attracts customers. The hard part is getting your content to stand out from the crowd. How are you supposed to compete with stories about snowstorms, scandals, or Snooki’s meatball baby? And, more importantly, how can you create something meaningful and valuable to your target audience? In this session, we’ll explore what makes content interesting. Armed with research, case studies, and insights from other industries, we’ll identify techniques to help your content: -Capture people’s attention. -Keep them interested and involved. -Convert interest into action.
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Well, this IS Interesting Content & the science of interest
Melissa Rach | Dialog Studios
flickr user: madabandon
Housekeeping
Twitter: @MelissaRach Slides: bit.ly/interestingcontent DialogStudios.com
flickr user: madabandon
Frank Rose The Art of Immersion
“We are now at the intersection of
lure and blur.”
flickr user: David Choi
Short and
pithy?
Long and substantive?
Trustworthy?
Humorous?
Dialog Studios can help you use content to connect with the people who matter most to your organization.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j4ae94ECbm0
Videos?
Graphics?
Puppies?
10
Puppies!
Puppies!
Interest 101
12
Interest is…
Necessary
©2013 Melissa Rach. All rights reserved.
13
“Information foragers”
Goal-oriented
Action-oriented
Learning-oriented
flickr user: martin_vmorris
Uncomfortable
Interest is…
©2013 Melissa Rach. All rights reserved.
Stephen Anderson, Applying Curiosity to Interaction Design
Connective
Interest is…
http://mywifesfightwithbreastcancer.com via Sarah Marx Cancilla
Increasingly complex
Interest is…
Learn
Understand
Learn
SocialInterest is…
“Social foraging”
flickr user: urbanlegend
Storytelling!We’re good at that! But are we? flickr user: mrkmobilephoto
Learn & Understand
Share & Expand
Learn & Understand
Share & Expand
Learn & Understand
Even better!
We know:
• Interest has several different purposes
• Interest is about filling knowledge gaps and making connections
• Ongoing interest requires increasing complexity
• Sharing and storytelling takes interest to the next level
5 things you can do
1. Get yourself interested
[Employees] want to be part of something larger than themselves. They want to be part of something they're really proud of, that they'll
fight for, sacrifice for.
—Howard Schulz, Starbucks
What makes people think they need to drink coffee from a coffee cup and water from a glass?
Why are we drawn to novelty coffee cups with phrases like “World’s Greatest Dad” on them?
How does a coffee cup get all the way from China to the US and still sell for a profit?
When do coffee cup sales rise and what does that tell us about the American public?
Bored? Ask different questions.
flickr user: Janne Haarni Pratik Dholakiya, How to Write Interesting Content for a “Boring” Topic
By Michelle Jaworski on May 29, 2013Email
Parents are now serving up their children at tea time with the latest photo meme to hit the Internet: baby mugging.It doesn't involve taking mug shots of a baby (although they may disagree when they're old enough to see the photos) or robbery. All you need is a baby (or pet) to photograph, a coffee cup, and a camera.
Baby Center on Instagram
Why is it fun to put babies in a mug?
2. Focus on helping people
[People] learn what they care about, from people they care about
and who, they know, cares about them.
—Barbara Harrell Carson,Thirty Years of Stories
Try
Buy
SolveEvolve
Triggering Need
Learn
getting
keeping
Linda Ireland, Domino
Choose wisely
flickr user: Bahai.us
3. Find information gaps(and decide which to fill)
Stephen Anderson, Applying Curiosity to Interaction Design
Decide which gaps to fill
Creating a
gap
Novelty
Impact
Conflict
Loss
Proximity
Prominence
Timeliness
Currency
Emotion
4. Make it easy
flickr user: AudreyH
Joseph M. Williams
Style: The Basics of Clarity and
Grace
“Good writing is good manners.”
Thanks to Margot Bloomstein
Silvia Appraisal
Theory “Comprehension is the
hinge between interest and
confusion..”
flickr user: marc falardeau
Absorption, concentration, and interest come from tasks in which the person’s skills
match the challenge. —Daniel Berlyne
Conflict, Arousal, and Curiosity
Ariad Communications, Content Changes Everything
Apes seem capable of using language to communicate. Whether scientists are remains doubtful.
—Douglas Chadwick New York Times
flickr user: epSos.de
“The relationship between emotion and social transmission is more complex than valence alone.”
There is a relationship between viral content and emotional impact.
Write to others as you would have others write to you.
—Joseph M. WilliamsStyle: The Basics of Clarity and Grace
5. Talk, teach, listen, learn
(again)
Listening is successful
Encourage
conversation
flickr user: Theis Kofoed Hjorth
In review….
So, how do you make content interesting?
Thanks! Questions?
Twitter: @MelissaRach #confabinterest Slides: bit.ly/interestingcontent
DialogStudios.com flickr user: madabandon
Extra thanks to:Julie VollenweiderChristine Benson Tenessa GemelkeSean TubridyMargot BloomsteinRick AllenSarah Marx CancillaMargot Merrill FernandezSarah Krznarich Nicole Jones
flickr user: CollegeDegrees360
More information
Paul Silvia, Interest—The Curious Emotionhttp://www.uncg.edu/~p_silvia/papers/08%20CDir,%20Interest.pdfFrank Rose, The Art of Immersion http://www.artofimmersion.com/Webpop, A Puppy Can Sell a CMS http://www.webpop.com/blog/2013/04/16/can-a-puppy-sell-a-cmsJonah Berger and Katherine L. Milkman, What makes online content viral?http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1528077Joseph M. Williams, Style: The Basics of Clarity and Gracehttp://www.amazon.com/Style-The-Basics-Clarity-Grace/dp/0321112520Stephen Anderson, Applying Curiosity to Interaction Designhttp://johnnyholland.org/2009/08/curiosity-and-interaction-design/Michael Wesch, A Portal to Media Literacy http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J4yApagnr0s Linda Ireland, Dominohttp://www.aveus.com/thought_leadership/books/domino/Barbara Harrell Carson, Thirty Years of StoriesOut of Print, no link availablePratik Dholakiya, How to Write Interesting Content for a “Boring” Topichttp://www.copyblogger.com/boring-topic-content-marketing/Daniel Berlyne, Conflict, Arousal, and Curiosity http://www.apa.org/pubs/books/4320468.aspxAriad Communications, Content Changes Everything http://www.ariad.ca/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/contentmaturity.pdf
flickr user: CollegeDegrees360
