This weekend I was cruising through digg and came across an example of how you can completely “ruin the ride” by not giving me what you promised.
The Digg post was on the 9/11 report and subsequent conspiracy. Before we get any further, yes it was horrible tragedy, and I’m not making light of the situation, just using it as an example. Ok the digg post reads like this:
Damn it, I said it before, Have you read the 9/11 Commission Report?
I’m not giving up on you Diggnation, Colbert Nation, 42 Nation, whatever nation you’re in. I want you to watch this, and pay close attention. It’s 30 minutes that could change your life.
The title is good but it’s the last line that ‘call to action’ the ‘30 minutes that could change your life‘ that gave me the impetus to click through. When the video started it began with some words on the screen (blah blah blah), some senator person using way too many words to babble on about something (more blah blah blah), and someone who was as dynamic as tax attorney or accounting teacher READING OUT OF A BOOK. It sucked so bad I zoned out and was in no way motivated to pay attention to what he was saying. In short we went from :
The 30 minutes that could change your life
to 4 minutes I’ve wasted listening to something I couldn’t even tell you about. So what’s the take away here:
- You aren’t Steve Jobs. He can take as long as he wants to get where he’s going, from his history we know it will be worth the wait.
- If nobody knows who you are (and trust me they don’t) step up and get their attention first. Lead off with a you absolute best most compelling, riveting shocking awe inspiring information. Once you’ve got your audience eating out of the palm of your hand, you can spoon feed them the facts.
- If you promise me something give it to me. If you promise me the 30 minutes that will change my life give me 30 minutes that will change my life, don’t give me 4 minutes that will change my life buried somewhere in 26 minutes of talking heads.
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Nice post (and catchy title!). It’s funny how people still don’t realize how ADD-riddled today’s web users have become. Give us your compelling content, and give it to us NOW. Don’t make us watch four minutes of crap, or read a page of filler, or watch thirty seconds’ worth of ads before giving us the good stuff. Argh.
While it’s sad to see how impatient society has become, it’s necessary to adapt to user habits.
the title was influenced by “web pages that suck”, and yep it may be sad but adapt or be left behind.
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