The Three Buckets of Content Structure

Remarkability Institute with Bart Queen

Welcome to the remarkability Institute. This is Bart queen. If you've been following us over the last couple of podcasts, we've been focusing on this idea of around crafting content. Crafting content is probably one of the most difficult things to do well. If you don't do the hard work upfront and keep it simple, the complexity of your content for your listener for the receiver is even more difficult.

[00:02:10] Statistically, we are told that we should be crafting our content at an eighth-grade level. Guys, there are some organizations that will tell you it should be fifth-grade level. I'm not talking about your vocabulary; your work with a Ph.D. group of folks use Ph.D. vocabulary. What I'm talking about is sentence structure.

[00:02:34] I think the greatest example of this is you say today, those who remember when USA Today launched in the eighties. Everybody made fun of that paper. They said this newspaper would never be successful. They called it "McPaper" because it was written to simply, and they added color. But what I find fascinating is that the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal they followed suit.

[00:03:06] They began to add color, and they made it simple to read, and for the listener to consume one of my favorite books, when I talk about content, is why business leaders speak like idiots.

[00:03:20] The subtitle is a bullfighters guide, the whole focus. All of that book is creating content to the point that your listener can absorb it and walk away with it. Crafting your content and understanding the structure of your content is foundational to build the message that your listener can walk away with.

[00:03:48] So, as we spend our time together today, I want you to walk away with the key components. The structure at a high level so that you can craft that content, fill in the buckets, and then whatever you want to do within them. You can now there are, in essence, three major buckets today that I want to make sure you build your awareness around.

[00:04:18] Number one, bucket, number two, the body of what you're sharing, whether that's the body of a keynote speech, the body of a Ted type talk, the body of what you and I would call a presentation or a sales call. The other major bucket that you have to build into or think about is what I call foundational information.

[00:04:47] This is foundational information or pieces like the logistics of the meeting. When you're going to take a break where the cocktail party is after the meeting's over those logistical pieces. The second part of that is your credibility, the credibility of your company, and the credibility of yourself. And the third bucket in that foundation is the background.

[00:05:14] This is the information you should be pulling forward from a discovery or research piece that gives you the foundation to share your three key points, your four key points, or five key points, whatever you're going to do. Now, the first thing I want to address is what I call the three T's. So if you have a pen and paper, I want you to note these three T's are your topic, your theme.

[00:05:44] And your title. Now, I want you to notice the order. I put them in topic, theme, and title. If I'm doing some type of a communication class, and I've got people beginning to work with content, I will ask them to put down their topic. 99% of people will put down the title. That's not what I want you to note first.

[00:06:10] It's the last thing I want you to get you to do one purpose of a title. The number one purpose of a title is to grab your listeners' attention. Now, when you're crafting your titles, whether you're doing something more from a written perspective, say you're writing a white paper, writing a book, or you're doing it from what you're going to probably call it more of a presentation type situation.

[00:06:37] You're allowed two subtitles. You can do two. You can do just one. One subtitle gives clarity to the topic. The second subtitle is a benefit to the listener. If you're speaking or a benefit to the reader, if you're writing number one purpose of a title, grab your attention, your two subtitles, then give a benefit and clarity to that theme.

[00:07:05] So don't put—marketing optimization. Don't put financial optimization. That's boring. Come up with a title. How to go from zero to 60 in 12, the top three ways to succeed in your business. Those are the kinds of titles that grab someone's attention. And then you can do your subtitles. Here's what I want you to do the next time you go to your local bookstore, you go to Barnes and noble.

[00:07:35] You go wherever you might look for a book on a Sunday afternoon when it's pouring rain and you going to want to drink a cup of coffee and relax, pick up any book, and you will see this principle lived out in some form or another. The very first thing I want you to note is the topic. So I want you to picture a bullseye, and that red bull's eye in the center of your target is your topic.

[00:08:01] It's boiling it down to something simple. It is not a sentence. It could be your solution, tool, or product. It could be a pain you want to solve. It is very simple. Now, this is where most people get hung up because they're going to go. I don't want to say that. That's okay. I'm not asking you to say it.

[00:08:23] I'm asking you to get a razor focus on what the content has, and then you can expand and talk from there. Your theme is where you want to build something into your meeting presentation or talk a mountain climbing theme, a gardening theme, and an athletic theme, a marathon theme. Now, what I want you to remember about this theme is this can give you an opportunity to express something about yourself.

[00:08:57] I just had a friend who just bought a motorcycle, and he's all excited about it. It sounds like that's a passion for him so that he could build this idea of his love for motorcycles into what he wants to share and to his. So next podcast, he's going to make an analogy around that allows him to speak expressively.

[00:09:21] His passion comes forward, and here's the interesting thing. Any one of his listeners that has a love for motorcycle is going to want it to jump onto that podcast because they have something in common with him. And here's that me too. Factor again. This is where you win the quicker. You get someone to say, me too.

[00:09:41] Me too. You pull them into your content. Now, guys, this information I've just shared with you. It's just around your topic, your theme in a title. One of my favorite books on business leadership is called beyond the summit. Skinner is the author's last name, presale mountain climber, almost climbed every single mountain in the world.

[00:10:05] He decided to write a book. Now he decided that this was what the topic would be business leadership, what he realized was all the principles he learned in climbing a mountain. He could apply to in business leadership, the title of the book, Beyond The Summit picture on the book.

[00:10:28] I believe it's K2 topic in the book, business leadership. The theme in the book mountain climbing in my mind, a tremendous example of someone who leveraged what I call the three Ts. Now that second component, when you're crafting content and your structure are you're open and your close. These, in my mind are the most important.

[00:10:54] So I want you to remember something don't muddle the beginning and don't muddle the end. If you want to muddle something, model the middle; you want an open that grabs them and pulls them in immediately. Guys, remember you have 30 seconds to engage a...