Enterprise Account bao
Got Your Attention?
Book

Got Your Attention?

How to Create Intrigue and Connect with Anyone

Sam Horn
Berrett-Koehler, 2015
Buy book or audiobook

Read offline

  • 0.5×
  • 0.75×
  • 1×
  • 1.25×
  • 1.5×
  • 1.75×
1×

Editorial Rating

8

Qualities

  • Applicable
  • Engaging
  • Inspiring

Recommendation

Most people’s attention span is only eight seconds. How can businesspeople with products or services to sell reach consumers through today’s fog of useless information, distraction and alienation? Communications expert Sam Horn offers a new, practical, applicable approach in her insightful and fun-to-read manual. Her “INTRIGUE” technique for presentations that stick will help you find the “phrase that pays,” “cause aha’s with ha-ha’s” and “put your words into a beat so they’re easy to repeat.” Marketers can put her down-to-earth concepts instantly to work to build their brands and increase their profits.

Summary

Most people’s attention span is shorter than that of goldfish.

Most people’s attention span is eight seconds. That’s not just terrible; it’s downright embarrassing. Harvard’s Nancy F. Koehn says goldfish have a longer attention span: nine seconds. Fast Company magazine reports that one out of four people online will move on to something else if their desired website doesn’t open within four seconds.

In today’s pandemic of alienation and impatience, people have stopped paying attention to one another. According to Utne Reader, a dangerous disconnect between people continues to grow. The combination of a desperately short attention span and a growing unwillingness to connect creates difficult obstacles for marketers. If you can’t get people to pay attention and you can’t connect with them, how can you promote your product or service or give an effective presentation?

Successful communicators and salespeople apply the “INTRIGUE” method to convey sales information.

As a communicator and a person, your goal is to connect with people, not to impress them. Understand...

About the Author

Branding and positioning strategist Sam Horn helps people create one-of-a-kind presentations and pitches and has a popular TED talk on the INTRIGUE method.

Comment on this summary