Making ideas stick with donors

Most urban legends persist, and it doesn’t matter that they are not true. If stories that don’t inspire, ennoble or (actually) inform us stick, why don’t stories that do? Why don’t stories about the important work done by nonprofits stay in people’s minds and then get passed along?

That is the issue faced by Chip Heath and Dan Heath in their book Made To Stick. Heath and Heath believe there are six principles that apply to ideas that do stick with people.

Those principles are:

• Simplicity. Find the essential core of an idea. Proverbs are a good model because they are both simple and profound.
• Unexpectedness. Surprise will grab their attention, but interest and curiosity will hold it. Systematically open gaps in their knowledge, and then fill those gaps. The surprise should be germane to the message.
• Concreteness. Explain ideas in terms of human actions, of sensory information.
• Credibility. Citing sources can be a great help, but sticky ideas carry their own credentials.
• Emotions. We can influence people to care about our ideas by getting them to feel something.

Stories. Research shows that when we mentally rehearse a situation we perform better when it actually comes. Hearing stories acts as a form of rehearsal.