A previous post discussed the importance of headlines (and titles); your first impression to strangers, your millisecond chance to catch interest before the audience bolts.

So what are the 4 most powerful words, in any language, that research tells us are the most powerful, effective and persuasive in whatever formula you choose to use in headlines??  These words rank highest in power and persuasiveness because they speak to our basic needs and interests as human beings, no matter our culture.  They are Mother Nature’s words and should be added to any headline to give it extra zing.  The words are: FREE, YOU, NEW and HOW

So let’s look at each important word separately to give it proper due.  I’ll start with FREE this post.  Using free will deliver more attention than any other word, hands down.  Why?  Because free has an ingrained appeal that we are gaining an advantage, and we are competitive creatures.  Additionally we hate to miss out on anything (called loss aversion) so we pay attention when anything free is offered our way.  Even when we don’t necessary want the item, we still stop to consider it, telling ourselves “Hey why not – it’s free!”

But watch out for the many kinds of free that are out there.  Free can have a variety of connotations. All “free”s are not equal.

I was recently at a conference where the keynote speaker, John Eckman, CEO of 10up, spoke about 3 versions of “free”:

Free as in Beer

Free as in Speech

Free as in Puppy

And I would add: Free as in Lunch

Free as in Beer – it’s really free, a small inconsequential item, like a beer, a stick of gum, or in the old days, bumming a cigarette.  No big deal to give or get.

Free as in Speech – or as in Liberty, it’s inherent, but needs to be usable to be appreciated.  In this sense of free, knowledge and ability to utilize is key, or it’s unneeded and will be wasted or refused.

Free as in Puppy – no actual cost now, but there are costs down the road – food, vet bills, time requirements – so there are responsibilities attached to accepting the free item, that expend resources.

Free as in Lunch – (and there’s no such thing as a free lunch) a more consequential free item offering, but there are with mental strings attached that kick in reciprocity; when accepted it’s a known favor and you will owe the giver, even with claims of being truly free with no strings attached (ha!).

All these nuances of free are part and parcel of the real meaning behind giving and accepting something as free.  So the next time you are drawn in to something that claims to be free, ask yourself which is the real understanding behind the free; which “Free as in…” is it?

Next time the topic is: the power of the word YOU – how Mother Nature’s word lands in our brain.

Comment below –  What are you offering for free?  Or what have you accepted that was truly free?

I came across a few articles in the paper recently that illustrated different brain patterns at work.  One piece was about a lawyer being sued by the client for filing an appeal on the client’s guilty verdict.  In another article a man shot and killed a woman who was banging on his door early in the morning. And a third one referenced composers adding jokes into classical musical scores.

The lawyer filed the appeal believing it was routine good client service.  Afterall, who doesn’t want to exhaust all possible avenues to avoid the death penalty?  Apparently not that client, who had clearly stated he did not want an appeal; he was guilty as charged and ready to die.

The lawyer’s brain kicked into the normal pattern of behavior; he wrongly assumed that the typical pattern was the right and only path.  No deviations from the pattern were ever considered.  Now his spotless career is marred; he’s being sued for acting without client authorization.

The second piece illustrates that when a pattern involving heightened emotions begins, it’s extremely hard to not follow it to a sometimes tragic conclusion.  The woman pounding on the door was just in a car accident and was distraught seeking help.  The homeowner mistook the woman’s agitated state for extreme danger and reacted in perceived self-defense, warranted or not.

And the third article illustrates to how hard it is to go against an ingrained pattern.  Classical music is supposed to be serious; there is no room for levity in this form of high art.  A joke here is considered cheap, vulgar and simply unacceptable. Haydn, Beethoven, Mozart purposely placed inappropriate musical forms to disappoint audience expectations (the jokes). But the audience didn’t get that it was a joke.  Or they understood the intention but refused to laugh.  Only serious emotions were permissible for their beloved music.  The composers breaking pattern was simply not acceptable.

Patterns are not routines, although they are close cousins.  Routines give structure to behavior.  Patterns, as described here, relate to thoughts, ideas, and ways of thinking. The brain seeks patterns, as the best way to make sense out of a bombardment of data.

Brain patterns help sort through information, but also limit thinking when they are followed automatically.  Recognizing patterns at play is the key to effectively using them to best advantage.

So when you recognize that you are in or about to enter a pattern of behavior, stop for a split second and consider what’s about to happen.  Is this a good pattern or a bad pattern?  Will following it help you or hurt you?

An example of a ‘bad’ pattern in writing is the word “don’t”, which forces you to take the unwanted action.  Writing “Don’t worry about a thing” causes you to worry.  This is because the brain thinks in pictures; the word “don’t” is not able to be pictured, so the next picture pops up: you as worried.

An example of a ‘good’ pattern in writing is the word “because”, which assumes a valid reason is coming after it.  Writing “I hope you’ll plan to attend the event because we will be unveiling our newest model.” is stronger than, “I hope you’ll plan to attend as we will be unveiling our newest model.”  The pattern at work here is: after “because” there follows a good reason.  (FYI, the higher the stakes, the better the reason needs to be.)

Next time the topic is: word meaning clarity – how paying attention to nuance is critical to full understanding of meaning.  Plus, I’ll review the 4 top words in advertising headlines, looking at each one separately.

Comments?  What behavior driven by brain patterns have you observed?

I was dog-sitting my daughter’s new-to-her dog last weekend and realized that the ill-behaved little mutt shouldn’t be foisted on anyone she cared to keep in her social circle.

And certainly not on the person who gave her the gift of life!  He was not simply poorly trained – more like fully untrained.  Unruly.  Annoying lack of waste expelling control.

Since we were to spend 2 long days together I got out my secret weapon (hotdogs) and began the training process.  He was wildly responsive to training and quickly began the process of changing his bad behavior.

Like dogs, people also want to be good.  They just don’t know what you want of them.  And we don’t communicate our wishes due to some unwritten code that it’s rude or wrong to tell other people what we want.  Says who?

So we unconsciously train people in how to treat us – with our silence.  If they are annoying, or take advantage, or treat us without respect and we say nothing, we teach them that it’s OK to behave like that around us.  And so the bad behavior persists, without realizing why. You are your own worst enemy when you don’t exercise the control you (perhaps unknowingly) possess.

People quickly learn how to act with certain people, which can be very different with certain other people.  It’s not that everyone is treated the same by everyone else.  You train people, or rather you should train people, in the behavior you want to receive from them.  But first you must realize that you have this training power in your possession available to you.

So how do you exercise this power when communicating with others online?  How do you train them to treat you as you want?  To start, you must decide what it is that you want before you can go about trying to get it.

Most people want respect – they want their online communication not to be ignored, to receive serious consideration, to be acknowledged politely as appropriate.  Does this about sum up the behavior you are seeking with your online communication?  So how come you aren’t receiving it?

Are you training others to ignore with your persistent battering?  Are you using language that effectively says ‘this is a spammy sales pitch that you want to run far away from!’ Is your content so unnecessarily detailed, drawn out or irrelevant so as to be perceived as a time-waster?

If you recognize yourself in any of this, then you have your answer – you are inadvertently training your audience not to want your online missives.  And the resulting reaction – being ignored, deleted, or non-responsive – should not be a surprise.

Next time the topic is: brain patterns and how they interfere or help communication.  Recognizing the patterns at work is a big part of communicating well, especially online.

Comments?  Are you training or mis-training your reader?

Maybe you’ve heard the expression: to ‘assume’ makes an ass out of u and me.

Now there’s a cliché with some truth to it.

Yet assuming happens so much it’s unfortunately rather commonplace, “Oh, sorry, I just assumed you knew (…assumed you were told) (…assumed you would do ‘x’) (…assumed you would think ‘x’).”

And all you can so is erupt with a furious, “Well you assumed wrong!”  Or the rhetorical “Why would you ever think I could possibly know the unknowable?!”  “How could you assume something so stupid?!”

With email, the comments remain unspoken.  But the anger is real.  And the resulting mishaps that relied on assumptions not being made in error are also real.  Potentially very large mishaps.

So the easy and obvious solution is to simply never assume.  Right?

No, hold on, you say, it’s not me assuming that’s the problem here – it’s the other person who is doing the assuming without clarifying! (It’s always you, not me, who’s the problem, but that’s for another time.)

So here’s the solution that you don’t want to hear: you must take the time to scan every piece of writing, every email, every memo, every document to see what assumptions are inherent within.  Yes, slow down and take some extra time to insure clarity.

Do you assume the reader has some specific knowledge?  Are you sure they really have it, and have it as fully as you think they do?  Can you give important details, just in case they are needed?  At best, the extra info is helpful or a needed brush-up.  At worse you are repeating yourself, but that’s not so bad.  Just make sure it’s not done in a condescending you’re-an-idiot way.

While clarifying your information, your message, your expectations may seem unnecessarily redundant, if the result is important, it’s worth taking the extra time to do so.  And even things that aren’t as important can be very annoying when done wrong and need to be redone.  Often with a grumbling “I wish she had just asked me instead of assuming I knew what she was thinking…”

No one wants to do a bad job or intentionally screws up, large or small.  It goes against our self-image to fail.  So we really try.  But we rush, to get it all done.  And we assume when we shouldn’t.

Not assuming and protecting against others assuming can help clear communication channels.

Next time the topic is: training others in how we want them to act, online and offline.  And you do know that you are training others how to treat you every day with every interaction, don’t you?

Comments?  Have a wrong assumption story to share below?

It’s so easy to do – to hide behind technology.  The internet has made many otherwise ‘good’ people into master sneaks. 

“Email?  What email?  Sorry I didn’t respond but whatever you sent must have gotten ‘lost’ in cyberspace…”

“You actually expected an immediate response from me?  LOL! Have you SEEN my inbox?!  I am trying to wade through 100s of messages a day and can barely keep up.  In fact, I’ve given up; I have no prayer of getting to the bottom of the pile, where your message probably is…”

“I love email – it’s so fast.  Please email me as the best way to get through to me.  Phones are so old-school.  I rarely use them anymore in favor of EMAIL” (sadly fast does not equal effective)

Then there’s the purposeful voicemail message – the one left intentional at a time when the person isn’t around to answer, so as not to be tied up wasting a bunch of time on niceities when just the quick response is wanted.

And call screening has been around since answering machines were invented.  Maybe a phone conversation is your best channel of communication, but you’re just not going to be able to get through.

So how do you address these and other cloister issues and get people to come out from hiding behind technology?

The reality is that it’s not going to happen all the time.  And we need to embrace the reality.  Technology is here to stay, and with the good you get the bad.

But the other reality is that you don’t want everyone to come out from hiding – just “your” people, the special few percentage of the population, or maybe just one in the case of email, that you want to grab and hold their attention to your message.

And you do that by knowing them so well that your message speaks to them at their core.

This core usually involves a problem that they need solved.  And you’re the best one to help them solve it, right?  Integrity and belief in yourself counts.

Get their attention on the problem, help them solve it and you won’t be ignored.

We all have problems; we are all seeking solutions.  Be the clearest voice (not the most obnoxious) to get through all the online noise.

Sounds easy, and it isn’t that hard.  If you need more support on this how specifically to do this, let me know.

Next time the topic is: inaccurate assumptions we make online without bothering to check them out, which can lead to dire consequences.  “Oh, I just assumed…”

Comments?  Have a hiding behind technology example of your own?

My headline problems are solved because I now have some easy fill-in-the-blank headline templates that are practically guaranteed to get my messages read!  Wow, finally the magic bullet I’ve been looking for! – all I have to do is plug in my info and my message will be noticed!!  And maybe throw in a few more exclamation points for good measure!!!

Wait – not so fast, Bucky!  Which headline template should you use – they all sound good… which one is best for my message?

Here are some fill-in-the-blank formula examples (the good, proven to work ones, of course!):

          How to _______ for ______

          Who else wants ________?

          Know the Secret of ________

          Here’s a method that’s helping ________ to ________

          Now you can have/do _________ like __________

          Have a _______ / or build a __________ you can be proud of

          What everybody ought to know about _________

          Why ________

          How ________ is your answer to __________

          (#) Steps to ____________

I know you are happy that I will be sparing you from the literally 100s of other headline templates that could be added to this list.  Why slog through anymore?  Aren’t these 10 confusing enough?

Let’s say your topic is ‘weight loss’ and you are looking for a headline for a blog post or email campaign that will get noticed and opened.  Plugging in these templates with that topic all sound like good headlines to use, so how do you choose?

          How to lose weight and look great for wedding season!

          Who else wants to lose 10 pounds in 30 days? 

          Know the real secret of losing weight and keeping it off

          Here’s a weight loss method that’s helping hundreds to lose unwanted pounds

          Now you can have your old weight back like when you were 20

          Have a body weight that you can be proud of

          What everybody ought to know about losing weight safely…

          Why this weight loss program is the real deal

          How controlling your appetite is your answer to permanent weight loss

          5 Steps to successful weight loss that stays lost

Now I just made all of these up, since I know very little about weight loss programs, but, they all sound like they would grab attention, as long as they’re true, right?  Or do they?  Since I’m not the target market, I don’t actually know the appeal or lack of appeal of this set of headlines.

But I do know how to help you choose.  One key is a deep understanding of not your target market, but your ideal client (the difference between those two concepts is for another time).  When you understand that avatar well, you know which benefits she’s looking for.  You know her biggest fears.  You know what dire issues keep her worried.  You know which headline speaks to her core.

The next consideration is to know where you are in the action sequence – what do you want her to do?  The job of the headline is to draw the ideal client in to the body content (and let the others who are not ideal fall by the wayside) with a complete story of what’s coming. So what is the purpose of the body content?  Is it to educate?  To engage for further action (like comment on a blog post)?  To move down the sales ladder towards a sale?  If so, where is this piece on that sales ladder? Is the headline directing the reader properly towards the desired purpose?

Another consideration is the mindset type of your ideal client that you want to attract.  Are you educating a do-it-yourselfer?  Great, but is the headline really a DIY headline?  Or is your ideal client a do-it-with-you type (someone who you would love to be hired by to coach her through the process).  Many make the mistake of putting out a DIY headline (“How to…”, “5 Steps to success with…”) when they really should be showcasing a DIWY (Do It With You) headline, to attract the right mindset type.  The professional expert wants to attract the DIFY (Do It For You) type – the person that doesn’t want to bother getting her hands dirty, which the professional expert is very happy to spare her of, for a fee.  But are they broadcasting with a DIFY headline?

Headlines take much time to get right, which is time well spent.  The headline (or title) is the gatekeeper; if the reader doesn’t enter within the first few seconds, you rarely get a second chance.  That first impression is all-important in setting the groundwork for what’s to come.  Don’t blow it looking for a template formula shortcut without further considerations as outlined here.

Next time we’ll explore some other ways to get noticed online.

Comment below on headlines – the good, the bad, and the ugly.

 
     After a hiatus to regroup and rethink how to best use this space to give the greatest value to the most people – this blog is back and better than ever!

What do most people want? Most people want:

1. To solve their immediate pressing problems, easily and quickly (the movement towards pleasure and away from pain)
2. To feel good about themselves à receive public recognition (the drive for self-affirmation)
3. To be entertained, to laugh or have a lighthearted moment (life is short, eat dessert first!)

All in the space of a few online seconds!

The purpose of this blog is to serve the #1 want, in as much as the pressing problem is related to communication issues with others. And really, all problems with others are due to communication issues.

Much researching has given me a deep understanding of human behavior, especially communication problems with others reflecting universal human nature traits.  We are hard-wired to behave certain ways. Knowing these secrets can help to solve many the communication problems.

As there are many pressing problems that could be addressed, it will take time to get to your issue (unless you comment and request it).  But keep reading this blog and your issue will likely come up in time.

We live in a digital world.  Online communication has become our primary communication channel – and our biggest headache.

Dealing with miscommunications, lack of clarity, and overall communication confusion has become a battle.  The biggest culprit is email, which can consume up to 50% of working time.  Yes, sadly a whopping 50% of the working day can be spent on email, and not wholly productive time either – wow!

So the overall focus of this blog will be on issues/problems in written communication, with a concentration on online communication problems in business.

To learn what the greatest communication frustration is in business and online communication, I recently surveyed over 200 LinkedIn contacts.  The results were pouring in, even as I was sending out the one-question surveys. The subject touched a nerve.

This is not surprising as we spend so much of our time online. The digital channel has become our primarily channel of communication, for external and internal communications.

The LinkedIn survey results, while not surprising in content, were surprising in the clear message of the top two frustrations.  The top two replies reflected more than 60% of overall responses.  There was a big gap between the top two and the next two, which made up another 31%.  And the intensity of all replies was ranked high, hence the quick replies.  This subject touched a nerve indeed.

Here, then, are the survey results.  And read on in future blog posts for how to deal with these problematic issues.

 “Greatest Frustration with Online Communication

in Business” Survey Results

1. No response to emails                                                    32%

Bombarded by huge volume of incoming, with little time to respond well, some were annoyed that others expected a fast response (the exact opposite response of #4). So much useless communication, spam and distractions online don’t allow the important messages to get through – being heard among all the online noise is the top frustration.

2. Hide behind technology                                                29%

This followed closely behind #1 – the ease and speed of online communication has displaced the effectiveness of phone and in person conversations, which is lamentable.  We have diminished our capacity to call or visit, which is preferable to email. The result is time wasted instead of saved, by going back and forth in long email threads to try to clarify understanding, mistakes being made, and unnecessary conflicts arising due to misinterpretations of tone.

3. Assume incorrectly, don’t seek clarification    18%

Making assumptions without bothering to clarify, then acting on those assumptions causes problems (“I’m sorry, I thought…”; “I assumed you wanted me to do (blank) and you were OK with it.”), conflicts, and strains relationships needlessly.  This rampant behavior also breaks trust, shows a lack of caring, and is as rude as it is wrong.  An adjunct to this is switching channels situationally and not taking the time to insure full understanding (“Didn’t you get my text (response to email)?”; “I responded in FB to you (original question posed in voicemail).”)

4. Timely response – not!                                                  13%

Failure to acknowledge receipt of the communication and respond in a timely manner was repeatedly noted.  Common courtesy so the person isn’t left assuming the email was received and they aren’t waiting needlessly, or more likely being ignored.  Important pieces of business can fall through due to emails that are a priority for one person not being prioritized by the other person.

5. Misc annoyances, but not strong numbers       8%

Other items contained in survey replies did not garner enough responses to note.  Yes, personally annoying, but individually so and not shared by many others.  Please mention in the comments if your top frustration was not one of these big 4.

Knowing these top grievances is one thing – doing something about them is another thing entirely.  Having the knowledge the survey provided is only helpful if it is followed by answers and support on how to change the situation and how to solve the problems described.

Each frustration will be covered in upcoming blog posts.

Until then, continue the conversation by posting a comment below.

“I know just what you need, which is to do…”

“If you were smart, you would do …”

“Been there myself, and the answer is to…”

Hey, stop trying to ‘fix’ someone or fix the situation with words – not helping!  To be helpful, begin by sharing their feelings.  And sometimes that help comes in the form of primarily silence, with a ‘mmm…’ and accompanying supportive body language.   Open by asking about the upsetting situation, then just be there for the person, sharing in feeling of the experience vicariously.

Another unhelpful communication: someone in distress hears in response: “What I try to do when these kinds of things happen to me is to be open to all that life brings, whatever comes” or other similar dribble.  Hearing that can move you quickly from sad to mad, to the point that you just want to reach out and slap the ‘comforter’ (but please refrain from physical violence!)  Those kinds of condescending words, coupled with a blasé tone, can send a distressed person over the edge, if they are thinking clearly.  But usually, people give other people the benefit of the doubt (“Oh, I know she meant well.”) since to do otherwise would just add to the distress, making things worse.

The best way to comfort a person in distress, after sharing in the feelings, is to then recognize where their source of authority comes from – is it internal or external?  Do they look to others for approval, or do they look inside themselves for their standards?

If they are external, then reinforcing to them that they are not alone and everyone else in a similar situation would react the same way, take the same action they took, etc. would be welcomed.  In the eyes of others, yourself included, they are still admirable and good.  Your support is critically important to a person with an external source of authority.

If the person has an internal source of authority, clearly take a different tract.  Tell them that they know in their heart that they are right, they took the best and only course of action open to them, they didn’t compromise their principles and lived up to their standards.  Hearing others opinions does not count to an ‘internal’, especially when distressed.  Their own best judgment is what matters, and your verbal support is likely not that important, as they can work out their issues largely alone.  Physical support and more silence than words would be best appreciated.

In no case is fixing the person the answer.  People are not things, and you are not a handyman.  Good communication skills require knowing when to speak, when not to speak, and what to say when you do speak, to be most helpful to the situation at hand.

“Of COURSE I love her – she’s my daughter, isn’t she?”  “I love my son just as much as the next parent, even though sometimes he drives me absolutely over the edge!”  No (good) parent doesn’t love their kid – at least they don’t openly admit to it.  That’s a dirty little secret that remains keep tucked deep within private confines – that one child is disliked over siblings, or just not liked period.  This secrecy is absolutely a good thing when the child is young.  For a parent to admit not liking their own young child as they are growing up would do serious damage to the child’s psyche.  But what about when the child is no longer young and developing, but is a full-fledged adult, out of the teenage years, and has turned into an adult that is, frankly, not an adult you would choose to like?

There are many people in this world that you recognize you do not like, and there is no expectation that you should like them all.  We like other people because we have things in common with them, have shared interests that both enjoy; we enjoy the company of others when those others make us feel good about ourselves, make us laugh, are just fun to be around.  We think that because we have so much “in common” with the long shared memories of our adult children that we must necessarily like them.  But is it really true, if you look into your hearts of hearts?  Is every child really a parent’s best friend?

Indeed there is an obligation to love our children in a familial way, but like is not love, and an adult child does not guarantee that the evolved personality is one to our liking.  Yet we feel a sense of responsibility that somehow we created the final product, and so there is a mental obligation to like and love a product of our own creation.

But in reality we do not literally create our children into the people that they become; the creation myth is a fallacy.  Indeed parents are very influential in the child’s first teachers, but life happens to children, with experiences and other contacts that are way beyond a parent’s control, short of living a sheltered life in an unhealthy bubble.  The experiences in life added to the child’s innate nature can result in an adult that is disagreeable, selfish, whiny, in a word unlikable – of which the parent in no way takes 100% responsibility.

These confused feelings – ‘I should like my child, so of course I do’ mixed with ‘rationally I know that you will know him and to the world of what what what what what it’s okay to choose not to like any other adult, even your child’ – are often not looked at.  Who wants to look deep into their heart and admit a possible distasteful truth?  What is it to be gained by doing so?  How do you deal with brutal honesty, if it is brought out into the light of day?  Best to leave it alone, right?  Let sleeping dogs lie, don’t rock the boat, and all that.

Most people go through life not looking for a deep relationship with their child who if they looked, they may discover that they do not like.  Interactions between parents and such a child can remain superficial and that is often fine for both sides because it keeps the peace.

For those who want more in the relationship, the sadness is that it is really hard to change who we are.  But if the relationship is important, and if the caring is high, the effort to improve the relationship is worthwhile.  The greater sadness is when the caring is only one-sided, because working on a relationship is a two-way effort.