How to shape your idea to fit what's popular

A reader sent me a question after last week's post (which was on the difference between what you should talk about and what you must talk about). Here's what she wanted to know:

"I would love to know what to do when you are asked to talk about what is 'sexy' and 'popular' but you feel is totally pointless." She went on to note that often people want what they don't need... and don't want what they do.

The struggle is real, y'all. The Struggle. Is. Real.

In fact, it's what drives a lot of the "should" feelings we were talking about last week.

See, your audience (whether that's an actual audience or your clients and customers) already have thoughts and opinions. You know this, of course, but it's a right pain in the tuchus for you as a message maker or content creator, because more often than not, you want people to have your thoughts and opinions.

Worse still? Their thoughts and opinions are pretty solid. One could even say they were pretty close to "set in stone" (you'll see why in a minute).

As the one trying to get them to shift some of those solid thoughts and opinions, you could be tempted to think they're the ones that need to do the work. Because change is work, and all that.

But that's where we get it a bit backwards.

Think of it this way: since you're entering their head space, you need to figure out how to get your thoughts and opinions to fit there. They don't need to fit with your thoughts and opinions. You need to fit with theirs. It's kind of like the "twelve-angled" stone from last week's #swipefile (OMG SEE WHAT I DID THERE? That's how you use the #swipefile!). In order to fit in with the rest of the stones, to fill the gap in the wall, the carver had to do some precision shaping on that one critical piece.

You are the carver. You have the piece. Now it's time for some precision shaping.

How do you do that, you ask? The first step, frankly, is to give people what they want. They want a stone, you give them a stone. They want a particular topic, you give them the topic.

You have to sell what people want to buy. Full stop.

I can hear you saying it now: "But how can I do that and still be focused on what I must talk about, like you said I should do last week?"

You shape your topic to fit their need. Now, hear me on this: You don't change your topic to fit their need. You shape it.

For example, since I was the executive producer for the world's oldest (and one of the largest) TEDx events in the world, people often want me to speak about "How to give a TEDx style talk" or how to make marketing messages, sales stories, and even proposals as powerful and as memorable as a TEDx talk (not to mention as short!). My main topics, though, are really all about ideas, messages, and creating sustainable change.

Actually, they're really, REALLY about a way to create constructive cognitive dissonance to create that sustainable change... but no one knows they need that. Heck, few outside of pychologists even know what that means. So I found a way to simplify it and call it the Red Thread®, instead. (And got it trademarked, even!)

If you need to do something similar, (a) start with what people think they want and then (b) figure out how to link it to what you think they need. Here's the kicker, though: your answer still needs to give them what they want. It has to, or people get angry, as well they should. No one likes a bait and switch.

So if someone wants a talk on TED-style presentations or messaging, I'll start there. I'll figure out what question they're already asking that my real topic (the Red Thread) can answer. As I'm planning my presentation, I'll start with a Goal Statement that captures that question (e.g., "How can you make your messaging as memorable as a TED talk?").

From there, I'll frame a Problem in a way that introduces a perspective that leads into Red Thread territory. Something like, "When crafting messages, we often focus so much on what we want to say, we forget what people need to hear."

To make sure that point lands, I'll figure out a self-evident or provable Truth Statement that makes that new perspective hard to ignore. For this hypothetical talk I could use something like, "Great ideas are built, not found." I follow that with a Red-Thread-related Change Statement like, "Recreate the conditions in your audience's mind that created the idea in yours." And voilà, we're at the Action of "Find the Red Thread."

And see? I've still given them their original Goal, because the Red Thread IS how they can make their messaging as memorable as a TED talk! The Red Thread isthe approach I developed and used to coach speakers at TEDxCambridge (and which have gotten 9 million+ YouTube views and five speakers promoted to TED.com). I started where they were, and moved with them to where I wanted them to be.

You can do that, too. Start your message (and your marketing for it) with something people already want. From there, you can lead them to what they need, too. And hey presto! You've made what they need just as sexy and attractive as what they want, if not more so.

Pretty neat, right? I hope you think so, too.

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