A slightly edited version of a presentation I did for Semiofest 2017 that looks at new trends in attention. Digital Communication is being disrupted by the attention economy. The old rules don't apply. This slide deck looks at new and emerging solutions for communicating effectively in the digital world. If the slide deck caught your attention and left a positive impact be sure to reach out and connect.

1. Sending Signals
That Reassure
In the
ATTENTION ECONOMY

2. The next slide likely isn’t reassuring.
It also doesn’t make any sense.
But it is one of the main takeaways
of this presentation.

4. To get to why that slide is important, we
need to start with 3 quotes.

5. William
James
(1890)
My experience is what I agree
to attend to. Only those items
which I notice shape my mind.
The Principles of Psychology
“ ”

6. Seth Godin
(2011)
Every interaction comes
with a cost.
Not in cash money, but in something
worth even more: the attention of the
person you are interacting with.
Seth Godin, typepad.com
“ ”

7. Fortune
Magazine
(2015)
Attention has become
the most valuable commodity
in the media world.
The underlying principle is simple:
where the attention goes, the money
will inevitably follow.
Mathew Ingram, Fortune
(2015)
“ ”

8. Attention
transactions
drive the
economy.

9. Attention
transactions
matter.
Now
more than
ever before.
Just ask him.

10. The average
human
attention span in
2000
seconds
13

11. The average
human
attention span in
2000
seconds
13
The average
human
attention span in
2013
seconds
8

12. The average
human
attention span in
2000
seconds
13
The average
human
attention span in
2013
seconds
8
The average
attention span
of a
goldfish
seconds
9

13. The average
human
attention span in
2000
seconds
13
The average
human
attention span in
2013
seconds
8
The average
attention span
of a
goldfish
seconds
9
(according to a study
by Microsoft)

14. 1st problem:
Attention.
As Bill Gates
pointed out,
our audiences
don’t have any.

15. We can’t
spend more
time with
media.
We don’t have
any attention
to spare.
That is made
worse
because of...

16. The curse of
knowledge.

17. We used to get information like this.
These are firemen

18. Now we get it like this:

19. 2nd problem:
We have access
to tons of data.

20. So much data that we
don’t have time to
figure out what it all
means.

21. Those problems create new
values.
They interact with
New Economies.

22. Subscription
Economy
Where people
pay for
information they
can get for free!
They value
curation.
Its organized, relevant,
saves people time. And
trust is a factor.

23. Trust is a factor for many reasons.
One of those reasons is more and more
people are realizing...

24. With anything
free, we are
the product.
Think Facebook &
Google
Surveillance
Economy

25. The most
profitable
harvest that
exists is our
data and our
attention.
Surveillance
Economy
Drives low trust

26. 3rd Problem:
Trust.
Our audiences
don’t have it.

27. Fast
Company
(2005)
In our post-scarcity world,
distribution is not king and
neither is content.
Conversation is the kingdom,
and trust is king.
Jeffrey Jarvis, Fast Company
“ ”

28. So there are a lot of problems with
communicating in the attention economy.
We will get to how to solve those problems in
a moment.
First...

29. Why is
ATTENTION
a boundary
resource?

30. There are several elements that come
together to make attention a boundary
resource.
We will look at one.

31. Cognitive
load

32. Thinking is an effort.
Its a load. A cognitive load.

33. Like all loads, when the load gets too heavy,
things begin to break.
We have the same time in a day our
grandparents did when they read 1
newspaper a day.
Click the link on the next page to see what
we face today.

34. Same 1,440 minutes in a day
http://www.internetlivestats.com/

35. That overwhelming amount of information is
a problem because of what happens when
we are overwhelmed.
Click the link on the next page to see what
happens.

36. Overwhelmed = Impaired
https://youtu.be/6wTeQ2ly6Uw?t=2m52s
Apollo Robbins

37. When everyone
is overwhelmed
it means…
We are communicating
to a nation of
drunk people.

38. When you
communicate,
expect this.
This behavior
is the world
you need to
plan for.

39. Whoever filled out that form was either drunk
or on their smartphone.
It is basically the same thing.

40. There are even studies on it.
http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/pdfplus/10.1086/691462

41. An R-D-E
look a
solutions
How to
win the
battle?

42. Residual. What we did
in the past.

43. How to get
attention?
Make quality
content!
1,225 pages!

44. Dominant. What we do
today.

45. • Laugh at truly long-
form quality
content
1st
Backlash.
Now we laugh at
the residual.

46. • Can I scan it
quickly?
2nd
We
develop
easily
skimmable
content.

47. 3rd
We rely on
Visual
Content.
Emoji’s,
infographics
videos.

48. 4th
We use
Curse
Words.
Inappropriate /
bad
language
gets attention

49. 5th
We make
things move.
● Cinemagraphs
● Web animations
● Videos
● Gifs
https://www.apple.com/ipad-pro/

50. And the low-trust problem?
Vintage stuff. Vintage textures. Hipsters!
We prime people to think of an earlier time,
when trust still existed.

51. Nostalgia is a
trust signal
that signals
authenticity.

52. Emergent.
Looking ahead to
possible futures
What will we do
in the future?

53. Content
Shock will get
worse.
Content shock
"content output per brand increased
35% in 2015 and content engagement
decreased by 17%"
We will continue solving
the information overload problem
by making it worse.
1st

54. Easy
will become
the new true.
2nd
1. Make it easy
2. Make it familiar
(cognitive fluency)
3. Make the connections
= People like you.
Medium.com has their own
publication. They called it
“3 min read”.
Most of the posts on that
publication are
7 min or longer.
The title isn’t true, but it
promises easy.

55. Curation will
become the
new creation.
3rd
Less creating meaning
by creating new things.
More creating meaning
through curating existing content.
TRUST SIGNALS
1. Respect privacy
2. Offer transparency
3. Offer audience agency

56. Micro
Chunking
to Text
4th
I have a dream
Also called Syntactic Cueing or
phrase formatting.
Information design works. This
is Information design done to
sentences.
Listen to an orator do it.
Technology exists that can do
this to any website, by inserting
2 lines of code. People spend less
time on low value words,
more time on high-semantic
content words.
See Asym.co for more info.

57. Conversational
Presenting
Your Journey
Their Journey
Let them tell you what they
want to pay attention to.
Then expand the topics they
want, in the order they want.
X
✔
5th You get their attention
because they tell you what they
want to pay attention to.
Genius.

58. There is also
something
strange...

59. The
Von Restorff
Effect.
The quickest way to get attention is to
break a pattern.
6th

60. We blend in
to
avoid
attention.
The fish or
Zebra that
blends in
doesn’t get
special
attention.

61. So to get attention,
stand out.

62. To sum up:
I have
3 Suggestions.

63. Be very easy to
understand.
Assume this...

65. Break patterns.
Like this...

67. Be real.
When you exploit
trust signals...

68. People just turn to other trust signals.
It doesn’t last.

69. If you want to be
trusted
Be
Trustworthy.

70. Thank you
Edward Wilson
linkedin.com/in/semanticpaint/