Attention!

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May I have your attention please?  That’s what we’ll discuss today – how to grab attention.

It’s hard to do with so much competition for ears and eyeballs.

You have to make your message stand out. We saw a blog about a shining example of just this thing.

David Armano, an influential blogger, wrote a post about an e-mail from Darren Barefoot and Julie Szabo. They are the authors of the book, Getting to First Base: A Social Media Marketing Play Book.

Only it wasn’t just your typical e-mail. He not only noticed it … he stopped everything to blog about it! And here we are talking about it. So it worked, even better than they imagined!

So, you ask, what was so special about this e-mail?

Their e-mail was a digital photograph of a handwritten note. We’ll describe it here, but you can see the actual photo on David’s blog. The photo includes a pen in the upper right-hand corner, a decorative stamp in the lower right. It’s all placed on a visually pleasing background. The easy-to-read, cursive text is written with a silver paint marker.

It’s incredibly well-done. It looks like something you’d see on a postcard or a poster.

Let’s talk about what Darren & Julie did right.

#1 – They were original.
They didn’t send an e-mail OR a hand-written note. They sent a PICTURE of a handwritten note. How unique!

#2 – They spoke to David as a friend.
Their letter starts out “Dear David”. The next line compliments him and his site. The tone is friendly and personable.

#3 – They were polite in their request.
They didn’t assume anything. They asked him to check out their book, but didn’t presume that he would like it or even comment on it.

#4 – They provided a customized link.
This was their final special touch – they provided David with his very own special link to their book. How special would that make you feel? It also made it very easy for him to check them out.

They intrigued him, flattered him, and made it easy for him, but they made one mistake that could have blown it all.

They misspelled the word “you’re”. They spelled it “your”.

David said that it didn’t bother him because he was so impressed with everything else. However, to some people it could have been a deal-breaker.

So the lesson is – when you create your stand-out piece, make sure you proof it and proof it again. Get a second set of eyes on it, too!

Do you have an attention-grabbing secret that you’d like to share? Leave us a Comment!

No one claims authorship of today’s bigg quote, but it’s still a good one.

So don’t worry about coloring inside the lines, just color and make a splash.

Next time, we’ll discuss what we can learn from two country classics about getting in tune with your job! Can you say YEE-HAW?

Until then, here’s to your bigg success!