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Made to Stick

Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die

By Chip Heath, Dan Heath

(98)

| Hardcover | 9781400064281

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Book Description

Mark Twain once observed, “ A lie can get halfway around the world before the truth can even get its boots on.” His observation rings true: Urban legends, conspiracy theories, and bogus public-health scares circulate effortlessly. Meanwhile, people with important ideas—businessmen, educators, politiContinue

Mark Twain once observed, “ A lie can get halfway around the world before the truth can even get its boots on.” His observation rings true: Urban legends, conspiracy theories, and bogus public-health scares circulate effortlessly. Meanwhile, people with important ideas—businessmen, educators, politicians, journalists, and others—struggle to make their ideas “stick.”

Why do some ideas thrive while others die? And how do we improve the chances of worthy ideas? In Made to Stick, accomplished educators and idea collectors Chip and Dan Heath tackle head-on these vexing questions. Inside, the brothers Heath reveal the anatomy of ideas that “stick” and explain sure-fire methods for making ideas stickier, such as violating schemas, using the Velcro Theory of Memory, and creating “curiosity gaps.”

In this indispensable guide, we discover that “sticky” messages of all kinds—from the infamous “organ theft ring” hoax to a coach’s lessons on sportsmanship to a product vision statement from Sony—draw their power from the same six traits.

Made to Stick is a book that will transform the way you communicate ideas. It’s a fast-paced tour of idea success stories (and failures)—the Nobel Prize-winning scientist who drank a glass of bacteria to prove a point about stomach ulcers; the charities who make use of the Mother Teresa Effect; the elementary-school teacher’s simulation that actually prevented prejudice . Provocative, eye-opening, and funny, Made to Stick shows us the principles of successful ideas at work—and how we can apply these rules to making our own messages “stick.”

Critics

  • Sticking points

    Made to Stick: How Some Ideas Take Hold and Others Come Unstuck by Chip and Dan Heath 304pp, Random House, £12.99 This is a book about what makes some ideas more effective than others. It explains what it is that makes you notice them, understand the ... (read full critics)

    guardian.co.uk published on Sat, 25 Sep 2010

  • Made to Stick By Chip Heath and Dan Heath

    Why do we remember some advertising jingles and not others? How did we learn to wear seatbelts? Why do we scan food labels looking for trans fats? Because of sticky ideas, the memorable messages that catch and hold our attention. Dan Heath, an educat ... (read full critics)

    bookpage published on Tue, 14 Sep 2010

10 Reviews

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  • 2 people find this helpful

    Changed the way I communicate forever

    Up there with a Rogen International course in terms of changing my communication practices permanently, overnight.

    Is this helpful?

    bigyahu said on May 28, 2007 | Add your feedback

  • *** This comment contains spoilers! ***

    The Keys to S.U.C.C.E.S.!

    Why do some things stay with us forever and other things just fade away never to be seen again? Dan and Chip Heath’s book “Made to Stick” takes a close look at the original idea of stickiness made famous in “Malcolm Gladwell’s book, “The Tipping Point” and takes it one step further by providing a s ... (continue)

    Why do some things stay with us forever and other things just fade away never to be seen again? Dan and Chip Heath’s book “Made to Stick” takes a close look at the original idea of stickiness made famous in “Malcolm Gladwell’s book, “The Tipping Point” and takes it one step further by providing a strategy to achieve messages that stick. From the very beginning, the authors hook you with their easy to remember acronym for remembering their six guiding principles. The keys to S.U.C.C.E.S.s is through memorable ideas that affect our behavior and help fight the “curse of knowledge”, that hinders us from creating newly unique ideas that purposely stray from what we know (p. 19-21).
    The six principles outlined describe how your communication can be improved to make ideas become “stickier”. First, creating SIMPLE messages that are compact and prioritized help clearly communicate your message to your core audience (Heath, p. 46). As the author’s described (2008), companies like Disney have created an entire culture around a simple message that helps every employee understand their role (p.60). As a “cast member”, you understand that your job is to put on a show for the guests and the choice of this terminology reminds employees of that role every day.
    Furthermore, in order to make ideas stick, the message must be UNEXPECTED and CONCRETE, capturing multiple senses and memories. Again, Disney acts a great example of concrete and unexpected memories. You often hear about the hospitality that Disney offers, but usually it is in conjunction with a memorable experience that you had on your family vacation. In fact, Disney created an entire communication campaign revolving around these family memories, capitalizing on guests’ magical moments. This leads us to the next key to success, CREDIBILITY. To be credible, you must help people believe in your idea through multiple authorities including internal and external resources such as scientific statistics (Heath, 2008, p. 287). For Disney, families that visit their parks every day helped create a “Moms Panel” which became an authority for guests to look towards for advice on planning their own vacations.
    This attention to detail and active commitment to hospitality also plays into the next step to success, the EMOTIONAL principle. According to the authors (2008), people will react to a particular situation and more often than not act based on their emotions (p. 287). For Disney, their advertising and promotions focus on the emotions associated with family and happiness. For the guests, seeing that Disney would like to share in their memorable moments means that they may be more likely to choose them as their next family vacation destination and that Disney has their best interests at heart. In order to be sticky, messaging must appeal to someone’s personal self interest as well as their emotions.
    Finally the last guiding principle is getting people to act through STORIES. As the authors discuss (2008), stories get people to do something by motivating them to take action (p. 288). Consider the new line of fit shoes that have recently exploded onto the marketplace. This simple fad has now become a rapid growing segment of the footwear industry. The original story stemmed from a tale of the Masai people who walked barefoot on uneven ground. This lead shoe manufacturer MBT to create a shoe that mimicked this walking experience and the exercising benefits that came with it. (http://us.mbt.com/Footer/Company/About-Us.aspx). This story stuck, inspiring millions of people to purchase these shoes to find a new solution to the old problem of convenient fitness.

    Overall, this book is a great read that is full of examples that help make the authors’ six guiding principles “stick” with you long after you have put the book down. The strategies discussed appeal to a wide variety of readers making this a perfect read for anyone trying to improve their overall communication. It is clear that these steps will help you create memorable stories that will lead to your personal S.U.C.C.E.Ss!

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    C123t45 said on Oct 23, 2010 | Add your feedback

  • create a mystery. tell a story. remember your audience is on a different level - as yet unafflicted by the "curse of knowledge". getting a message across has two stages - the answer stage and the telling others stage.

    though i was skeptical when i started, this is an incredibly helpful book for wa ... (continue)

    create a mystery. tell a story. remember your audience is on a different level - as yet unafflicted by the "curse of knowledge". getting a message across has two stages - the answer stage and the telling others stage.

    though i was skeptical when i started, this is an incredibly helpful book for ways to create and spot stories to get our points across.

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    Michaelkchan said on Aug 5, 2010 | Add your feedback

  • Good Topic

    It's a topic that caught my attention immediately. But perhaps getting too fed up with acronyms and guidebook structures, i'm not too excited reading this or the elaboration. Same reason that I started finding malcolm gladwell a bit boring~

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    Gagson said on Jun 10, 2010 | Add your feedback

  • although some of the messages are rather trivial (a concrete message sticks better than something abstract), the book is extremely well written. lots of examples and practical tips

    Is this helpful?

    Piet said on Aug 25, 2009 | Add your feedback

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