Small, compact ideas are more effective at breaking through the information clutter and getting shared on social media than big, monolithic ideas. As attention spans shrink and information overload increases, people are starting to actively resist lengthy ideas and instead prefer ideas that can be summed up concisely. This has ushered in an era where pull messaging of series of small ideas and patterns is more effective than push messaging of single masterpiece ideas. For an idea to spread widely, it needs to be easily explained and shared on social media in under 140 characters. Big brand slogans from the past may have been iconic but are now easy to ignore due to the distraction of technology.

1. BIG IDEAS

2. BIG IDEASare getting smaller

8. Big Ideas are BIG

9. Big Ideas are monumental

10. But Big Ideas canbe small too…

13. Why?

14. vs.A series of small ideasOne Big Ideavs.

15. Attention Deficit

16. We are inundated with information: data points, powerpoints, you name it.

17. To break through this clutter, branded content must contain a compact idea, a point

18. Small compact ideas fit into our headspace more easily than big ideas

19. So we’re starting to actively resist big, monolithic ideas.

20. So we’re starting to actively resist big, monolithic ideas.And seek out small, compact ones.

21. To use an art analogy: we’re moving into an era of more conceptual advertising

22. Of series and patterns, not masterpieces. Of coherence, not consistency.

23. An era of pull messaging, notpush messaging

24. And it’s allabout gettingheard.

25. But getting heard doesn’t mean that your idea will get...shared

26. And to have a shot at getting shared, your idea has to be…shareable

27. Small ideas are infinitely more sharable.

28. They can be summed up in less than 140 characters, explained in a Facebook post.

29. They can be summed up in less than 140 characters, explained in a Facebook post. They are light and they travel well.

30. And they help us define ourselves.Who am I, really?You are who your wall posts say you are.

31. Big, monolithic ideas don’t fair well in this environmentThey are often hard to explain to people.And there is rarely a motivation to share them.You are who your wall posts say you are.

32. Big ideas tend to be cumbersome and coercive. And they are increasingly easy to tune out.“A Diamond is Forever”“Maybe she’s born with it – maybe it’s Maybelline”“Breakfast of Champions”Maxwell: “Good to the last drop”

33. Big ideas tend to be cumbersome and coercive. And they are increasingly easy to tune out.All we have to do is turn our heads 5 degrees and look down at our laptop screens.

34. So what about the Nike work?I see it as a reaction to the “small-ideas” movement – a bigger and better kind of monumental campaign.

35. But even Nike complemented it with small-scale activation ideas.

36. Appendix

37. Not all brands need to act smallBrands that are highly targeted (e.g. B2B)

38. Brands that need to drive people to stores