Begin in the Middle
"Begin in the middle."
—Seth Godin
That's from yet another concise and to the point blog post from my spirit animal, Seth Godin.
How many times have you started watching a YouTube video, Instagram story or Facebook video and you end up clicking 'next' within 10 seconds.
There is lots of data that a whole lot of us do this most of the time. There is way too much content out there to consume for us to stick with a video, podcast episode, blog post, ebook or Netflix series that doesn't immediately grab our attention.
So when creating content we've got two options:
Complain to anyone who will listen about how technology is ruining attention spans and yearn for the glory days when things used to be so much better and blah blah blah
We can begin in the middle
As Seth challenges us to do in that blog post, begin in the middle. Begin with the good part. Provide value to your listener/viewer/reader as soon as you have their attention. They will always be happy you did.
As a side note, that is exactly what I love about Seth Godin's blog posts. They are "high protein" as I like to call them. He gets right to the point. Like, every single day.
And that is precisely why of all the blogs in the world, his is the only one I have delivered to my inbox every day of every week. I can't imagine life without his blog and a big part of that is because I don't have to sift through the pleasantries to get to the good stuff.
If beginning in the middle works for Seth, it can work for the rest of us, too.