Infinite creation. Finite attention.
AI made it cheap to make things and hard to get noticed. Anyone can now build, publish, and compete, including every competitor you have. When everything looks good, the best one does not win. The one people understand and care about does.
The advantage goes to the person who gives people a clear reason to care.
Write one line about the listener before slides, before a script.
Answer five questions first
Your Big Idea, then three parts that hold it up.
Two ways to find the three
Steve Jobs moves the Mac to Intel chips, June 2005. He says the room's doubts out loud, then answers each one.
| The doubt | His answer |
|---|---|
| "Now, why are we going to do this?" | "Because we want to make the best computers for our customers looking forward." |
| "Didn't we just get through going from OS 9 to OS X?" | The Mac has switched twice before, and each switch set it up for a decade or more. |
| "Isn't the business great right now?" | "We can envision some amazing products we want to build for you, and we don't know how to build them with the future PowerPC road map." |
A claim becomes real with a specific and something to compare it to.
Not after every claim. Let the person who vouches for you start with the doubt.
Pick the proof by the doubt
| If they doubt | Use |
|---|---|
| Is that number big or small? | A number beside something to compare it to |
| Will it work for someone like me? | A story from someone like them, opening with the doubt |
| Does it work? | A short demo they can see |
| Why should I trust you? | Someone else vouches for you, on stage or side by side |
| Is there a catch? | Raise the objection yourself, then answer it with an example |
Plan one moment, and say your line so a stranger can repeat it.
How to build a moment, like the envelope
Say your line three times, in the same words: at the start, in the middle, at the end.
Can someone repeat it to a stranger in one sentence?
On a video call, use the chat early and often.
Illustration adapted from a photo by Matthew Yohe, CC BY‑SA 3.0
Seven ideas that make people care.
Every music player was sold on its specs.
The benefit test: add "which means ___ for you" to any claim.
People care about what changes in their life or work.
The question to ask
What am I really selling?
Not the thing. What it does to their day.
Three points are easy to follow and easy to remember.
A new idea matters more once people remember what the old way cost them.
The order the whole talk follows.
| Step | This talk | The iPhone opening |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Get their interest | The iPhone clip, then the question in chat | The line of earlier products, then three become one |
| 2. Name the problem | The Problem | Phones are not smart and not easy to use |
| 3. Give the fix | The Big Idea and the 5 Stage Framework | One leapfrog product: the iPhone |
| 4. Say what it means for them | The iPod example, the benefit test | Fingers instead of a stylus |
| 5. Ask for one thing | The Recap's next step | Not in the opening |
Add "which means ___ for you" to any claim.
If you cannot fill the blank in their words, it is a feature, not a benefit.
If you are excited about it, say so, in everyday words.
Find a story, give it one twist, test it.
A story framework and a ready-to-use AI prompt, built from a breakdown of how Steve Jobs told his Bill Hewlett phone call story. It turns raw notes, transcripts, or memories into a short story with five beats: Hook, Entry, Break, Words, Turn.
Every detail in the story must trace back to the source. When a beat has no direct material, the AI moves down a fallback ladder of honest substitutes. If nothing on the ladder is real, it drops the beat instead of inventing one.
How to use it: read the framework once so you know the moves. Then copy the prompt at the bottom into any AI tool, paste your material and audience into the two slots, and run it. The AI will ask up to 3 questions if something important is missing, then draft the story and show an audit table tying each beat to its source.
Each beat gets a fallback ladder. Move down only as far as the source allows. If no rung is real, drop the beat.
Words (no dialogue exists)
Break (nothing surprising happened)
Entry (no single moment, only a process or a result)
Hook and Turn come from the lesson, so they rarely need inventing. The rule: the Hook must be something the story actually proves.
Copy everything in the box. Fill in the two slots at the bottom.
You are a story editor. Your job is to turn my raw material into a short story using the Five Beats framework. You work only from what I give you. You never invent quotes, events, details, numbers, feelings, or reactions.
THE FIVE BEATS
1. Hook: one bold claim at the start that the story will prove.
2. Entry: open at the moment something happens. No backstory, no scene-setting.
3. Break: one detail the audience would not expect.
4. Words: the exact words from the key moment.
5. Turn: the lesson, applied to the audience, ideally echoing the Hook.
SOURCE RULE
Every specific in the story must trace to my material. If I did not say it or provide it, it does not go in. "Plausible" is not a reason to include something. When you are unsure whether something is sourced, treat it as unsourced.
FALLBACK LADDERS
When a beat has no direct material, move down its ladder. Stop at the first rung my material actually supports. If no rung is supported, drop the beat and say so.
Words:
a. Exact spoken words I remember
b. Exact written words from the moment (email, text, review, document, message, sign, screen)
c. My own thought at the moment, only if I state it as a thought I had
d. Real quotes from customers or the audience that I provide
e. Reported speech, marked as paraphrase
f. A precise concrete detail (number, time, action) in place of words
g. Drop the beat
Break:
a. A real unexpected event, reaction, or detail
b. A gap between what the audience assumes and what was true
c. A disproportionate number from my material
d. Drop the beat
Entry:
a. A specific moment I was in
b. The first concrete action in the process
c. The moment the result became visible
PROCESS
Step 1. Inventory. List what my material contains: moments, exact words, written artifacts, numbers, reactions, the lesson.
Step 2. Three checks. Answer these in one line each:
Sequence: the events in the order they actually happened, from my material only.
Point: the one thing this story proves, in one sentence. The Hook and Turn must both serve it.
Emotion: the one feeling the listener should have by the end. Name which sourced details will produce it. Do not state the feeling in the story itself, and do not add reactions or feelings I did not describe.
If you cannot fill Point from my material, ask me before going further.
Step 3. Map. For each beat, state which rung you are using and quote the source line from my material that supports it.
Step 4. Gaps. If Hook, Entry, or Turn has no support, or if a higher rung on Words or Break looks likely to exist but I did not provide it, ask me up to 3 short, specific questions (for example: "Do you have the email he sent?"). Then stop and wait. If only lower rungs are missing, skip the questions and proceed.
Step 5. Draft. Write the story in the order Hook, Entry, Break, Words, Turn. Keep it short enough to tell aloud in about a minute unless I give a different length. Use plain language. No em dashes.
Step 6. Audit. After the draft, give a table with columns: Beat | Rung used | Source line from my material | Feeling it supports. Mark any dropped beat as DROPPED with the reason.
MY MATERIAL
[paste notes, transcript, story, or bullet points here]
AUDIENCE AND FORMAT
[who it's for, and where it will be used: video, email, talk, post]