How to Make People Care What You Think

Dale Carnegie, in his famous book, How to Win Friends and Influence People talks about the magic of developing genuine interest in others. As writers, sometimes we have a selfish streak a mile wide. After all, that is why we write, to share our "unique" view of the world with others. Have you ever written anything, posted it and just known that everyone would flock to read it, only to discover that hours, or even days later, your blog traffic was still hovering at 3 hits and those are your own?

Yesterday we talked a little about a universal sales formula. The first step in that process is a thing called "prospecting". This is the discovery process that a salesperson must go through to determine who wants, and or needs their product, and which part of that audience they have easy access to. As a part of that process a good salesman will spend time finding out about the potential customer, or developing a genuine interest in what makes them tick. As artists it is easy for us to attempt to forgo that part of the process, break out the soap box and start in to add our two cents to the conversation. The internet has made that even easier.

When we assume that people will be in shock and awe when they discover the TRUTH that we have single-handedly revealed we do ourselves a great disservice. We must always keep in mind that, just like us, others are most interested in what effects and benefits them, and not what we think they should be interested in. So, how can we go about this discovery process? What if we just slowed down long enough to think about our audience, before hitting the "publish post" button? I am intending to ask myself how it will sound to someone who has not had the benefit of my experience. How can I make it relevant to them?

So, your turn, what other questions should we be asking about our intended audience? And, how should this effect what and how we share as writers?