Renowned music journalist/pundit, Bob Lefsetz, recently authored a newsletter/blog post entitled, The Death of Cool. Toward the end of the rant he articulates his point most clearly:
We’ve been living with a class of professional, holier-than-thou trendsetters, who believe they determine what is cool. Cool is not so important anymore. Attention is king. And the longer you can keep someone’s attention, the more you’re going to win in the twenty first century.
Yes, attention is king; the hard part is capturing and maintaining people’s attention. MTV has fried most of our synapses to the point that we can’t focus on anything for more than three seconds. Hell, I’ve probably checked my email twelve times since I began writing this blog post. Everything is dumbed down, sound bites, quick hits, bulleted lists. Style has beaten Substance to a bloody pulp.
The current presidential race is no exception. Barack Obama, the candidate inspiring millions of people with his messages of “Change” and “Hope” is a perfect example of someone who understands the importance of attention. Obama is long on attention, but short on content. What change is he encouraging Americans to hope for? Even though many cannot articulate his legislative policies or programs, his ambiguous feel-good message resonates with so many of us; he has our undivided attention.
This is not to say that content has lost all of its importance. Good content certainly helps attract and maintain attention, but content alone is no longer enough of a draw. Politicians, musicians, filmmakers, bloggers and marketers need a differentiator—a hook—to grab the audience’s attention and draw them in. And once you’ve attracted that fickle audience, make sure to keep your message concise and do everything in your power to keep their attention. They’re already looking for the next shiny, new thing to glom on to.