attention span part 2: short satisfaction span

 expectations noose

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“I don’t think people read body copy.

I think we’ve entered a frenzied era of coffee-guzzling, e-mail-sending channel surfers who honk the nanosecond the light turns green and have the attention span of a flashbulb. If the first nine words of body copy aren’t “May we send you beer and money for free?” word 10 isn’t read.

Just my opinion, mind you. Raymond McKinney at The Martin Agency had it right when he wrote a line for those condensed-book study aids: “Cliff Notes. When you don’t have time to see the movie.”  Yet when I write body copy, long or short, I work hard at making it as smart and persuasive and readable as I can. I suggest you do the same. Because a few people are going to read it. And the ones who do, you want. They’re interested. They’re peering in your shop window.

So as much as I hammer away on the importance of visual solutions, when you have to write, write smartly.  With passion, intelligence, and honesty.

And when you’ve said what you need to say, stop.”

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Luke Sullivan

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So.

hey pay attention to meAttention span Part 2 is just a reminder that attention spans, short or long, are all about experiences and how all of us employ different attention strategies based on context <time & place>. Attention spans expand and contract depend upon context.

Ok.

To be clear. I believe <just my own personal ‘thing’> that the whole concept of short attention span is overrated.

In other words … it is ‘bunk’ <’bullshit’>.

Now.

What isn’t overrated is time management <or the fact we suck at it>. And the angst associated with managing time and your ‘to-do’ list and all the choices that constantly tug at you even when you know you are doing something you should be doing.

We are so stressed over time that we consciously, and subconsciously, employ different attention strategies to ‘maximize time’ <which is actually code for ‘maximize experience’>.

Uhm.

Ponder that <what I just wrote>.

I cannot tell you how often I have this discussion in business. People get so focused on ‘time’ and ‘if you don’t grab them immediately you will lose them’ and all the they have actually lost sight that the real discussion should surround ‘maximizing experience.’ That the challenge is to engage … and offer experience <too often I find myself spending gobs of time simply on ‘engage’>.

Regardless.

Short satisfaction spans have been around forever. Let me remind people of 2 things <beyond MTV … which sometimes seems to bear the blame burden for indoctrinating a generation to short attention span viewing>:

 

–          The Beatles

–          Charles Dickens <or Edgar Allen Poe or O. Henry or Doyle>

<huh>

Beatles?

They became popular by mastering the art of the 2 minute pop song. Almost every song you like by the Beatles <before the white album> probably averages 2:20 in length.

Ok. Next <because I know you have a short attention span>.

Charles Dickens.

short concentratedSerialized fiction.

Edgar Allen Poe?

Short stories.

How about Sir Arthur Conan Doyle <Sherlock Holmes>?

Short stories.

Short books.

Short attention span reading.

Short satisfaction experiences.

And even more relevant?

What Luke suggested in the opening quote … write smartly. With passion, intelligence, and honesty. And when you’ve said what you need to say, stop.

Regardless.

This whole attention to short attention spans doesn’t really have anything to do with an increasingly shorter attention span <because of technology or life or tv or The Beatles> but rather we people have always liked short experiences. Trendwatching calls this being a Transumer <and the corollary lifestyle called – Transumerism>.  Being a transumer is all about experiencing things in short small doses.  The whole idea is that the temporary, the transient, is increasingly being valued if not being sought out by people.

Why?

Well. Think about it. It makes sense. Mainly because everyday Life is typically about the grind. The routine. Getting up and doing what you need to do <in the home and in the business> and some consistency.

That consistency is tied to efficiency <which is aligned with the ‘grind’>.

pay attention look closely what stare huhTherefore the moments where we can quickly transition to a new experience and add a little color to an otherwise gray day have value. In fact … this sometimes means experiences have more value than ‘goods.’

This also means that many fixed items <or consistent experiences> run the risk of becoming synonymous with boredom, with hassle, with quickly-out-of-date, with maintenance, with taking up too large a part of budgets, if not lives … and most importantly … they become ‘gray’ <or even worse … associated with ‘the grind’>.

Look.

This is not about short attention spans … this is about short satisfaction spans. Which brings us back to the thought of Transumers. Because while we talk about short attention spans we are actually talking about people’s behavior.

People have always been driven by a desire for more experiences but it is possible <but not proven beyond hypothesis> it has become even more so in today’s world. And, frankly, experiences have always been about the unfixed … the moving and changing instead of the fixed. It is about satisfaction & variety <I hesitated to use ‘entertainment’ because that gets misused far too often.

It is about discovery. It is about fighting boredom and in many ways … building a more transient lifestyle experience <breaking out of the gray and the grind>.

Now.

It is a proven researched fact that many people are freeing themselves from the hassles of permanent ownership and possessions <see the decline in home ownership and cars among younger generations>. Much of the past ‘fixed’ is being replaced by an obsession with the here and now, an ever shorter satisfaction span <not shorter attention span> and an almost lust-like behavior to collect as many experiences and stories as possible.

Trendwatching also suggests this is the rise of what they call ‘the UNFIXED.’ Where change, things that are not ‘fixed’, actually has value <overlaid on top of consistency … just to be clear>.

Therefore … the value of experiences actually increases over ‘fixed’ physical expectation pyramidgoods.

And if experiences have such a high value that suggests ‘using’ is better than owning.

Some trendwatching thoughts along these lines:

 

–          Owning often means hassle.

The more stuff you permanently own, the more you have to worry about: repairs, going out of style, theft and so on. And owning often also means having to sink a large part of one’s budget into one object, which impedes spending on multiple experiences.

 

–          To many consumers, to be untied, UNFIXED, leading an on-the-go lifestyle, means freedom to explore, to discover.

More practical: freedom to travel wherever, whenever, and for some, even the freedom to work wherever, whenever.

–          As always, the well-off were trend setters: “Luxury consumers are spending more, in many cases lots more, on life-changing experiences, while their need for luxury goods is waning. Spending on luxury experiences in the US, including travel, dining, entertainment, spas and beauty services and home services, has nearly doubled over the past 5 or 6 years.”

–          As an increasing number of specialized, no-frills companies now cater to less well-off UNFIXED consumers, an affordable ‘on-the-go’ life is now possible, too.

–          A global C2C <consumer to consumer> infrastructure is in place, from eBay to classifieds, enabling <and even encouraging> UNFIXED consumers to quickly dispose of what’s no longer needed.

–          The online world offers the ultimate in UNFIXED living.mindset attention clutter universe people

The more time is spent online, the less need there is for fixed, hardly ever used physical goods.

–          Another aspect of UNFIXED: some positive side-effects for the environment?

More services and less goods, more shared ownership.

 

Anyway. Oddly. This also creates opportunities for the ‘fixed.’ As in fixed space stores & locations. It certainly creates opportunity for retail branding <without reconfiguring store>.

I know that I have personally made this presentation to a number of retail chains <grocery stores, hardware, etc.>.

 

–          Provide multiple experiences:

You can do this simply by floor decals, color changes in different departments, etc. As shoppers shift from one location to another within a store give them an opportunity to experience something different.

–          Status conscious opportunities:

Everyone prefers buying a brand versus a private label. Call it ‘climbing the ladder’ or simply being a status-conscious consumer. Retailers have the opportunity to access fractional ownership of status because it’s the only way for a consumer to be able to flaunt <both established and new> status symbols. Weekly or daily deals offer ‘experiential surprises’ which provide a little color to a typically gray experience.

 

Anyway.

The last aspect of a Transumer is something called  a ‘SNACK CULTURE perspective.’ This is kind of represents a version of what appears to be an insatiable craving for instant gratification. A snack culture world is where products, services and experiences become more temporary and transient. And products are deconstructed in easier to digest, easier to afford bits, making it possible to collect even more experiences, as often as possible, in an even shorter timeframe.

Please note.

This is not shorter attention spans. This is about being empowered to choose satisfaction in the size you want in context of where you are and how much time you have. We are becoming more accustomed to consuming large amounts of snack sized content <rather than the longer-form stuff of traditional media>.

 

<note: there is an interesting contradiction here in that we consume large amounts – sometimes even larger than we did before – but in smaller sizes>.

 

“Music, television, games, movies, fashion: We now devour our pop culture the same way we enjoy candy and chips—in conveniently packaged bite-size nuggets made to be munched easily with increased frequency and maximum shortcuts not therespeed. Today, media snacking is a way of life. In the morning, we check news and tap out emails on our laptops. At work, we graze all day on videos and blogs. Back home, the giant HDTV is for 10-course feasting – say, an entire season of 24. In between are the morsels that fill those whenever minutes, as your mobile phone carrier calls them: a 30-second game on your Nintendo DS, a 60-second webisode on your cell, a three-minute podcast on your MP3 player. Like Homer Simpson at the all-you-can-eat seafood buffet, we are capable of devouring whatever is in front of us—down to the plastic crustaceans—and still go fishing for Colbert clips at 3 am.

Wired Magazine

 

In the end?

This really isn’t about diminished attention spans. The fact is we are all transumers <on a spectrum of snack sized consumption>.

All of us.

Kids and adults.

We are a breed of consumer hungry for constant visual and auditory gratification. In fact … our transumer like mentality transforms us into ‘constantly moving happiness machines.’

So.

If we want to wag our finger at the ‘short attention span’ youth … we may want to look in the mirror first. Because we humans initially learn by imitation. That’s how we’re wired.

And that means we adults are wiring up our kids:

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Andrew Meltzoff and Patricia Kuhl, professors at the University of Washington I-LABS, show videos of babies at 42 minutes old, imitating adults. The adult sticks his tongue out. The baby sticks his tongue out, mirroring the adult’s behavior. Children are also cued by where a parent focuses attention. The child’s gaze follows the mother’s gaze. Not long ago, I had brunch with friends who are doctors, and both of them were on call. They were constantly pulling out their smartphones. The focus of their 1-year-old turned to the smartphone: Mommy’s got it, Daddy’s got it. I want it.

We may think that kids have a natural fascination with phones.

Really, children have a fascination with whatever Mom and Dad find fascinating. If they are fascinated by the flowers coming up in the yard, that’s what the children are going to find fascinating. And if Mom and Dad can’t put down the device with the screen, the child is going to think, That’s where it’s all at, that’s where I need to be.

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Regardless.

We have always had short attention spans … because we all have short satisfaction spans. This doesn’t mean exclusively short … of both … <and we would be foolish to believe ‘short’ is all that matters> … but day in and day out short is good to us. And I don’t mean short attention spans.

I mean short satisfying experiences.

In the end?

Let’s stop all this endless blathering about the ‘short attention span crisis.’ Focus on offering great experiences. If you do it right … the payoff for getting someone to pay attention is … well … what Hollywood says … “Movies are all about their last twenty minutes.”

crazy changes the worldYou get to close the deal on whatever it is you want to close the deal on.

Sell something.

Communicate an opinion.

Share a new thought.

Change attitudes if you do it really well.

Teach the young something.

Tell someone something meaningful.

It doesn’t matter.

If you get their attention you get to say something.

And isn’t that what really matters? Being heard when you have something important to say?

 

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Written by Bruce