Brandwithin | The Knowledge Marketing Center

The fast lane - and living in it is now the norm – at least when it comes to the Internet.There are so many metaphors for the speed of life these days, it’s hard to deny that so much of life accelerates around us. Years ago on my first visit to New York, coming from Australia I met someone there who said “We don’t live in the fast lane here - we live in the laser lane!” And the pace of walking on Manhattan streets was so much faster – I liked it – mostly.Now my business is based on the marketing of knowledge, so much of which has an online component, and the same metaphors challenge us. Tom Biederbeck of STEP: Inside Design magazine says “Success on the web is determined by presence—presence that is immediate, immersive and seductive. The line between what works online and what doesn’t is measured in seconds.” More focus on speed.

The website visitor, blog reader, YouTube viewer, Google searcher, and everyone online make split second decisions whether to stay and explore - or move on (usually never to return). So the essence (think headline) of your knowledge piece must first be clear, simple, bold, and able to be perceived at first glance. Our brains have been trained to distill complex ideas to simple ones in this A.D.D. world of busy-ness and information overload.The challenge for knowledge marketers is to craft the simple distilled concept first – do the work for the customer or site visitor – so they don’t have to. Then you have the best chance of grabbing their attention and engaging them. Web 2.0 design trends exemplify this – larger, simpler graphics, icons, symbols and simple statements.

“All the great things are simple, and many can be expressed in a single word: Freedom. Justice. Honor. Duty. Mercy. Hope.”Winston Churchill

in branding we call this the ‘Singular Idea‘. I learned this laser beam focus from my colleague Jon Ward — we explore it in Branding for Profit. A brand that is built on a Singular Idea has a faster and easier road to success. Effective knowledge marketing is built on the same focus.