Create Moments of Engagement

How short and simple can a video be and still be effective?

 

Shorter and simpler than I thought. I was impressed this morning when I logged onto The Wall Street Journal’s Lessons in Leadership series of videos featured on their home page.

 

I watched a 50-second video of Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg talk about she sparks creativity. It was ok and I learned something, so I clicked on Microsoft CEO Steve Balmer’s insights as a recovering micromanager — 60 seconds or so. I learned even more from a self-depreciating Mr. Balmer.

 

My observation: As mountains of content threaten to engulf us and our attention span has been beaten down to seconds, nuggets of insights and spoon-size bites of information can break through and create moments of engagement.  

 

A video doesn’t have to boast the production values of an over-the-top 60-second commercial. Packaging and promotion are important, but content is what's critcal. Often the simplest idea can be the most powerful, but as you know, it must be relevant to your audience.

 

I bet there are a lot of ways you can reach your audiences with relevant content—it doesn't have to be long, weighty or expensive to add value.

 

It takes one insight and a few seconds to break through, make someone’s day and boost your brand.

 

Check out Mr. Balmer and several other leadership videos at WSJ and see if you agree: Brevity is the soul of wit.

Today’s books are anything but old school.

Once upon a time a good novel was, as they say in philosophy, a thing in itself, a material object composed of atoms structured into a discrete number of pages. Your involvement with the book was limited to reading, imagining and perhaps discussing it in a book club or, if you happen to be the book’s author, and are quite lucky, on Oprah.

Not anymore.

Witness Personal Effects: Dark Art, a new supernatural thriller that follows art therapist Zach Taylor’s investigation of an accused serial killer who claims to have foreseen, but not caused, his victims’ deaths. Library Journal’s review calls it “the future of modern fiction.”

Created by Jordan Weisman, Dark Art combines the experience of a traditional novel with a multimedia-fueled “out of book” narrative. Clues in the novel, and items that come with the novel, such as ID cards and photos, propel readers into an online experience where they become protagonists themselves.

You can call phone numbers and get a character’s voicemail. Google characters and find them on real websites. Even discover in the art and other printed artifacts inside the book’s cover information and clues about the characters. This makes the reader a participant in the fiction events of the story, and thus more involved.

Of course, this kind of online extension is nothing new in the world of television dramas and reality shows, but it is new in the world of publishing. The dematerialization of information and content is expanding the possibilities of what it means to read and enjoy a book. Something that extends through time and space in a whole new way.