How do you attract people to your ideas?

Today’s paradox for businesses is how to get and hold the attention of those they need – in the world’s most over-communicated society in history.

In the age of the eight second attention span, we know people just aren’t engaging with almost everything that assails their senses. So what do we do?

Well, most people pretend they are getting through. And the capacity for self-delusion is alive and well across humanity.

Some just give up – and we know where that leads.

But some have worked it out and for them it is a stunning competitive advantage.

They all look different, but the succcessful ones use a deceptively simple common approach – they try to enter the conversation already taking place in their targets’ minds. Knowing this gets us started. But understanding that the doing can bring great challenges gives us the humility to do it sustainably.

Warning: Don’t make the common mistake and ASSUME their internal conversations just because that’s what they should be thinking about, or because that would suit you or your business. I still recall the easy assumptions I made about what young women thought about and wanted when I was in my late teens and early 20s. And how I was rarely on the same wave length. These days I work hard at it with my wife but still get surprises even after years of marriage and raising five children together.

So we shouldn’t expect to form a perfect picture of what gets and holds someone else’s attention. But we can get close enough often enough to make a huge difference. Especially when the blind majority are relying on guessing and wishful thinking.