Here’s How a Good Idea Goes to Crap

It starts so innocently.

The creative makes a new product, service, document, or presentation. She gives her heart to it. The design is beautiful. The narrative is clear and concise.

Later, the item in question gets passed around for feedback (because everything needs feedback). The first person says:

“Hmmm, are you sure everyone will know what you mean by Initiative Y?”

And then another:

“You should go a little further into detail on page 7.”

Should we do one more? Why not.

“Ooh, you didn’t talk about _____! We’ve got to have _____ in everything we talk about!”

All feedback points to more. More details. More explanation. More contingencies. More references. Suddenly, without anyone really knowing what happened, a well-designed work of art is now a Frankensteined mess.

Let’s do a little test.

What comes next in this sequence?

A,

B,

C,

D,

E,

F,

__

Did you feel that? Did you notice how your mind filled in information based on a pattern you already knew? The mind is powerful, no?

Yet if this exercise came from a corporation, it would read:

“Participation in this exercise is mandatory for all employees. For the following, you will be using the alphabet to complete our survey. Those who don’t remember the alphabet my refer to the document we’ve placed in our internal drive. If you need assistance on the exercise, be sure to contact your HR Business Partner. You will find the exercise in the attached document.”

Sigh.

You can see how this happens can’t you? It’s simple. The same thing happens with blog posts.

Why explain something in 200 words when 800 ranks better in the search engines?

Why have just one call to action when you want people to follow you on Twitter and Snapchat and YouTube and Facebook?

Why give a simple theory around a specific topic when you could add 6 easy tips to change your life FOREVER (!)?

The reason for this is simple. You’re trying to fill in gaps our brain would have gladly tackled on its own. You’re trying to change the lives of 1,000 people instead of one. You’re lowering your original thought to the lowest common denominator.

You’re trying to please everyone.

Please don’t.

Quick one today. Do you guys like the short form?

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-TB