made-to-stick

---
name: made-to-stick
description: Use when a message isn't landing — a tagline, value proposition, or pitch deck — to make it simple, unexpected, concrete, credible, emotional, and memorable.
category: Business Knowledge
version: 1.0.0
tools: []
---

# Made to Stick Framework

Craft messages that are understood, remembered, and drive action, using the SUCCESs checklist (Simple, Unexpected, Concrete, Credible, Emotional, Stories).

## Core Principle

The Curse of Knowledge is the single greatest barrier to effective communication: once something is known, it's hard to imagine not knowing it, which makes explaining ideas to others harder. Sticky ideas aren't born, they're made — the SUCCESs framework gives six principles that make any idea more memorable and impactful.

## Scoring

Goal: 10/10. Score any messaging (copy, presentations, campaigns, onboarding) by rating each of the six SUCCESs traits 1-10 and summing to a 6-60 total: 50-60 = 9-10 (extremely sticky), 35-49 = 7-8 (strong), 20-34 = 4-6 (forgettable), below 20 = ≤3 (won't stick). Always state the current score, which traits scored lowest, and the specific fix needed.

## The SUCCESs Framework

Simple · Unexpected · Concrete · Credible · Emotional · Stories. This is a toolkit, not a checklist — the stickiest ideas tend to use most of the six, but don't force all six onto a message that only needs two.

**Simple.** Find the core of the idea and share it compactly — simple isn't dumbed down, it's ruthless prioritization ("if you say three things, you say nothing"). Use the Commander's Intent test: if everything else goes wrong, what ONE thing must land? Lead with it (the inverted pyramid), so a reader who stops anywhere still gets the core. Example: "AI-powered, cloud-native customer engagement platform with omnichannel capabilities" becomes "Talk to all your customers in one place." Test: can a smart 12-year-old follow it? Warning: don't simplify into emptiness — "we make the world better" is simple but meaningless.

**Unexpected.** Get attention by breaking a pattern (surprise); hold attention with a curiosity gap (interest). The surprise must connect to the core message — find the counterintuitive implication and lead with that. Example: "A bag of movie popcorn has more fat than a bacon-and-eggs breakfast, Big Mac and fries, and steak dinner — combined." Open curiosity gaps with a question, a prediction, a mystery, or a challenge to assumptions. Anti-pattern: gimmicky surprise without substance.

**Concrete.** Use sensory, specific language instead of abstractions — abstraction kills memorability. "Improve customer experience" becomes "customers get their order in 30 minutes, still hot." The Velcro theory of memory: concrete ideas have more hooks ("bicycle" sticks better than "vehicle" because it can be pictured). Replace vague quantities with exact numbers, percentages with real units ("saves 40%" → "saves 16 hours/month"), categories with instances ("restaurants" → "pizza shops in Brooklyn"), and feature lists with demos.

**Credible.** Help people believe the idea with external credibility (authorities, credentials) and internal credibility (vivid details, human-scale statistics, testable claims) — internal is more powerful. The Sinatra Test: one example so good it proves everything ("if I can make it there, I can make it anywhere") — one reference so impressive it handles every objection ("we secured the White House" for security, "we handle Super Bowl traffic" for scale, "used by Apple, Google, and Microsoft" for quality). Make statistics human-scale: not "10TB of data" but "every book ever written, 100 times"; not "37 grams of saturated fat" but "more fat than a Big Mac, fries, and milkshake combined." A testable credential — "try it free for 14 days" — lets people verify the claim themselves.

**Emotional.** Make people feel something — people act on emotion, not analysis. Statistics numb; a story about one individual inspires action (the Mother Teresa principle: "if I look at the mass, I will never act; if I look at the one, I will"). Appeal to self-interest with WIIFM (What's In It For Me) — translate features into personal benefits. Appeal to identity — people decide based on who they want to be, not calculation ("Texans don't litter" beat any anti-littering statistic). Appeal to the right level of Maslow's hierarchy: security, belonging, esteem, self-actualization. Avoid semantic stretch: "support the troops" beats "support our national defense infrastructure."

**Stories.** Stories are flight simulators for the brain — they simulate experience, inspire action, stay memorable through narrative structure, and bypass argumentative resistance. Three plots that work: Challenge (protagonist overcomes an obstacle — inspires courage and perseverance), Connection (people bridging a gap — inspires tolerance and teamwork), and Creativity (a novel solution — inspires innovative thinking). Structure product stories as character (a relatable customer) → problem (emotional) → journey (what was tried, concrete) → solution (how the product helped, specific) → outcome (measurable and emotional). Mine support tickets, sales-call objections, user interviews, and internal wins for real stories rather than inventing them.

## The Curse of Knowledge

Manifests as jargon the audience doesn't share, skipped context that feels "obvious," and over-abstraction because the specifics are already known to the speaker. Fix it by testing messaging with outsiders (not the team), using concrete language instead of abstractions, telling stories instead of bullet points, and asking "would my mom understand this?"

## Applying SUCCESs to product

**Landing pages** — one clear value proposition above the fold (Simple); a counterintuitive claim or statistic (Unexpected); a specific outcome like "save 4 hours/week" (Concrete); customer logos and specific testimonials (Credible); a customer pain-point and transformation narrative (Emotional + Stories).

**Product demos** — show one core workflow, not every feature (Simple); start with the "aha moment," not a tour (Unexpected); use real data, not lorem ipsum (Concrete); show how a specific named company uses it (Credible); walk through what happens when a real customer hits the problem (Emotional + Stories).

**Onboarding** — one action per screen (Simple); a quick win early (Unexpected); real results, not abstract promises (Concrete); "join 5,000 teams already using..." (Credible); celebrate the first success with a real user's story (Emotional + Stories).

For full worked teardowns of famous sticky messages — JFK's Moonshot address, the Subway diet, "Don't Mess with Texas" — search the Knowledge Base for case studies showing all six traits operating together.

## Common Mistakes

Burying the lead (core message lost in details — fix with Commander's Intent); staying too abstract (nothing to remember — replace every abstraction with a concrete example); listing features with no emotional connection (tell customer stories, show transformations); using jargon (the Curse of Knowledge — test with outsiders); citing statistics without context (make them human-scale and relatable).

## Quick Diagnostic

Score each trait 1-10, fix the lowest, then re-score. Simple: can the core be stated in one sentence — if not, find the Commander's Intent. Unexpected: would this surprise someone — if predictable, find the counterintuitive angle. Concrete: is there a sensory or specific detail — if abstract, convert it. Credible: is there an internal or external proof point — if not, add a Sinatra Test example. Emotional: is there a WIIFM or identity angle — if all logic, add one. Stories: is there a named character with a journey — if not, mine one from support tickets or customer interviews.