Made To Stick: A Brief Summary

Words: 590
Pages: 3

In the book Made to Stick, the Heath brothers bring up some principles that make ideas more compelling, and the presentation on Google Photo made by Google in 2015 is a good example to analyze the usage of Heath brothers’ principles in real life. Overall, the presentation uses several communication principles in an effective way, such as “Story”, “Emotional” and “Unexpected”, while it can still be improved by applying the rule “Simple”.

The first principle used in the presentation is called “Story”. The speaker starts his topic with a story about his daughter's graduation and the enormous number of photos taken by his wife and him (1:00:16 - 1:00:36)[1]. According to Made to Stick, A story “provides simulation” - hearing it “makes us see pictures in our head.” [2, pp. 207-210]. Through the story, the speaker provides a vivid way for the audience to experience the difficulties brought by the traditional photo management tools - they have to “scroll and scroll” to find a specific photo(1:01:24 - 1:01:28)[1], and also the new possibilities brought by Google Photo to organize photos. The simulation makes people care, and attracts them to see
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According to Made to Stick, compared with statics and analysis, people’s emotions are more likely to “led them to act”[2, pp. 167]. Google Photo itself, along with the new technologies it uses like machine learning, is scientific and technical. However, the speaker makes them emotional by letting the audience think about the valuable moments in their own life - “the big moments, the small moments, the please burn the evidence moments”(1:00:53 - 1:01:04)[1]. He convinces the audience that Google Photo is much more than an innovation in technology, but rather a way to “relive the moments that matter”[1](1:01:14), and that is exactly what they care about. By “appealing to the things that matter to” people, we can catch their attention, and that is Google’s strategy[2, pp.