Content ARCs: how to own your ideas in the market

This is How Stories Happened, I'm Jay Akanzo.

This episode is about this enormous gap that I've seen

between having a good idea as an expert, as an entrepreneur,

as a business leader or a creator, having a good idea,

and then actually deploying it publicly and owning it publicly.

Whenever I work with a client to develop their premise,

that signature idea that informs their work and their personal brand,

we always arrive at this sticking point,

which is whether or not what we've developed internally

ever gets deployed publicly.

And there's a number of ways that you should be using your premise,

in other words, your signature idea,

that one onable concept that you can use

to summarize your perspective and distribute your message

and tell people like, sure, a lot of people cover my topic,

but here's how I see my topic, your premise, right?

Mine is think resonance over reach, for example.

So that premise of yours can and should show up

and benefit your platform in a number of ways.

It should turn into messaging.

It should turn into your signature speech

and all the public speaking systems for success

around your person and your idea.

It should be the thing that you speak to as a guest on shows.

Yeah, you're there to talk about your topics.

I'm there to talk about storytelling and speaking

and marketing, but I'm really there to evangelize

and kind of embody my premise of think resonance over reach,

right?

So guest appearances are informed by your premise

and of course work with clients,

whether before or after a contract, diagnostics,

sales calls, actual engagements,

your premise and all of your IP should show up everywhere,

helping you communicate with greater impacts,

no matter the situation.

But let's just make it smaller for a moment.

Let's focus on your content.

When you want to claim ownership of your ideas

in the minds of other people,

it's not enough just to like aimlessly talk topics

or share general expertise about your topic.

You have to actually explore your premise in public.

And that's where frankly, things tend to fall apart

because we go back to old habits

of how we used to create content

or we feel the pressures of the modern marketing world

or the channels where we show up,

something that my friend, Brendan Huffard calls

checkbox marketing, right?

So here is how to stop checking boxes,

to stop filling feeds and to start exploring

and owning your premise in the minds of your ideal audience.

So first, let's remember that we are not in the business

of creating content for content's sake.

We are using content as a thinking tool

and an IP development system.

Let me say it again,

we're not creating content for content's sake,

we're using content as a thinking tool

and IP development system.

When you consistently write or speak about your premise,

you improve your thinking and your language

while also at the same time uncovering specific elements

of your IP that you can use everywhere,

like frameworks, brand and terms, stories, et cetera.

In other words, by forcing yourself to write

or speak about an idea,

you find new and better ways to teach that idea,

new and better ways to package that idea

as pieces of your IP.

Everything tends to get better

when you force yourself to pick a focus

and then go explore it even before you understand it

and to end.

So when I work with clients, I let them know.

You're no longer checking boxes with your content,

you're no longer filling feeds.

Instead, you're gonna inform your thought leadership content

through what I call content arcs.

These are multi-week, one to two week maybe explorations

of a single theme, question or concept

hold directly from the language for your message,

from the narrative argument for your premise

that I've developed with you as someone I'm working with

as someone I'm advising.

These are multi-week explorations called content arcs.

Each arc follows the same method, A-R-C, arc.

A stands for ask, ask the logical questions that flow

from your last idea and also your recurring language

in your message.

I'll give you examples for all this in a second,

but first let me give you the acronym.

A is ask the logical questions that flow

from your last idea and also from your recurring

premise language.

R in arc stands for refine.

Now go refine your thinking by taking those questions

and creating multiple pieces of content,

exploring that question from different angles.

And C in arc stands for codify, codify your ideas

into ownable IP.

Now not all arcs will lead to something

as crystallized and memorable as a framework

or a branded term or a signature story,

but they always help you achieve some kind of crucial outcomes,

like improving your thinking, internalizing your own language,

and building an audience along the way.

So let me give you an example.

I might look back at my own message and my own premise.

Maybe I've only begun to develop this

and I have messy internal documentation.

I have gone through some of the exercises

that I lead my clients through to extract from myself

in this case, my perspective, and arrange it

as what sounds like an argument for people

to buy into my ideas.

I have this mountain of material,

but then I've arranged it in a slightly better way.

So I'm still in the messy early mode

of developing my premise.

And I read it and I go, huh.

In this premise, in this like long form version

of my premise, I keep telling folks

to think resonance over reach.

So if that is an emerging idea of mine,

then to actually like message it well

and to own it publicly, I need to go explore

that one idea of resonance through my content.

And so I'd follow this arc by first,

A, asking the logical questions that flow from this language.

It's like, okay, I keep saying resonance.

What does that word actually mean?

What is reach in relation to resonance?

Are they opposites?

Are they connected?

Does one lead to the other?

Why does it matter that we think resonance

over reach anyway?

So I'm asking these logical questions

by looking at a messy but slightly better bit of language

than just what's in my head,

because now it's on the page.

And I'm asking these logical questions

that flow from it to inform my first content arc.

That's the A, asking.

And then I start to refine my thinking

by creating multiple pieces of content,

exploring these questions from different angles.

So I might start with an essay,

just to try and define resonance.

Like, hey, we all want to resonate with other people.

What does that mean?

And I'll go look in the sciences and look in the dictionary

and talk about maybe an example from my world

or that I've seen with clients or whatever.

And I'll come up with my own definition

that maybe fits our world and work better

than what we see in the sciences

or what we see in the dictionary.

And then I'll move on.

I'll say, okay, that was the definitional piece.

Now the close kin is reach.

I've defined resonance.

Well, how does resonance affect reach?

And maybe I'll go exploring that in a post.

And these might be published as two pillar essays

that I send to my newsletter

or they might be published as social posts

or if I'm really committed, both,

because the more you repeat yourself,

the more you find better ways of saying what you're trying to say

or you uncover what it is you're trying to say to begin with

and also you build an audience along the way.

So all of a sudden, instead of random acts of content,

I have this coherent like mini journey

to understand a single idea

and then improve how I speak about it

and cement my ownership of it in your mind.

And so I'm doing that R stage of the arc.

I've asked the logical questions, A,

and then I've refined some of my thinking R

by asked by exploring those questions

in multiple pieces of content.

And then I arrive at the end of the arc,

maybe the end of a two week or three week sprint of content.

The end of the arc is the C codifying my thinking into ownable IP.

So by the end of this particular arc,

I'm like, wow, I have a definition of resonance

I can put in my back pocket, I can cite it everywhere,

I can link back to the original post

or just quickly explain that definition

if I'm asked or if I'm writing about it.

Here's my definition, by the way.

Resonance is the energy to act that others feel

when your message aligns so closely with them

that they feel amplified.

And I can unpack it and maybe remix it

so I don't just repeat myself or get bored.

The energy to act might sound like the urge to act.

When your message aligns so closely with them,

they feel amplified.

I might say their thoughts, feelings, and abilities feel amplified.

So I have this one core definition

that I can remix slightly or expand and explain more.

And it rolls off the tongue very easily for me.

It's part of my IP.

It's a term that I've defined that goes with me everywhere.

And it's something that I've done to package

and communicate my expertise in a repeatable scalable way.

That is me codifying my first initial arc,

in this case exploring the word resonance, into IP.

And not every arc will lead to something

that fruitful and reusable.

I might just leave an arc with greater clarity myself.

I might leave it with one piece

that I want a hyperlink to in the future

or send to a client because they need the resource.

Maybe I end with just like a signature bit, right?

It's not a framework.

It's not a branded term that I own.

It's not a signature story.

It's a signature bit, which is just a repeatable way

I can explain something, which is very useful in talks,

interviews, conversations, writing everywhere.

So for example, I might say, hey, think of it this way.

If reach is how many see it,

resonance is how much they care.

No amount of reach guarantees that they care.

But if they don't care, they don't act.

If they don't act, we don't see results.

So even though we obsess over reach,

it's actually resonance that drives results.

Resonance leads to revenue.

That's a signature bit.

It might be a few seconds, it might be a few minutes,

but I've said it before.

I've internalized it enough where I can say it

in a way that sounds similar and also sounds natural

everywhere I go.

So that arc was just me saying,

I have this emerging language that kinda sounds like my premise.

It feels still kinda raw and messy early in my journey.

Maybe I've written about it once

or maybe I've actually used the exercises

that I use with clients to develop my premise.

Let me step out of that language for a moment

and just scan it and ask the logical questions

that flow from it are refine my thinking

by creating multiple pieces of content,

exploring those questions from different angles

and then see codifying it into ownable IP,

branded terminology, frameworks, stories, signature bits,

ARC, ask, refine, codify.

And that lasts me two weeks, three weeks, four weeks

and now all of a sudden instead of random acts of content

or feed filling content,

I have a purposeful premise led exploration.

So I get to refine my thinking and also frankly package it

and own my ideas and people's minds.

All right, so let's talk about the strategy in practice for you.

Here's what I advise my clients do to create their own ARCs

and I offer my assistants on the first few ARCs

they create to get them familiar

when I'm in an advisory engagement with somebody.

And your mileage may vary based on your own ideas

and expertise if you haven't tried to develop a premise

for example, I have other resources

that you should explore on my blog or on the show

to help you get out of your head

and develop what I call a narrative argument,

which is this long form language that you use

to message your premise in a way that ensures others

actually buy into it.

It's the logical underpinnings of your message

to say, hey, you're doing something a certain way,

you're thinking a certain way, do it or see it

in a way I would prescribe.

You got to get people to buy into your message.

So I have this long form language in front of me

because I've started to develop by premise

and now I want to go dip into that like starter dough

and go cook something great, go bake something delicious.

Right, so now I'm going to create my content arc.

And so the first step is to read your narrative argument

that if you're working with me, we develop together

and if you haven't, it just might be at a homepage copy.

Whatever you say on your website,

it might be that you've gone through some exercises

you've heard from me before.

And now you're still in the internal theory of it all

and you're ready to go public through content.

So first, I always tell clients,

read the narrative argument that we develop together

and I'll do this with them or for them to get them started.

Now as you do this first step,

you want to save any ideas that the language sparks.

Sometimes they are direct references to the language itself.

Like you want to take that second paragraph

and share it elsewhere as a post

or explore it in a full essay in greater detail.

So sometimes you're just lifting passages

and sharing them publicly.

Other times you'll read something

and it'll lead to an entirely new idea

for an advice post, a story, a framework, something else.

So without judging it, I tell people,

read the narrative argument that we developed

and then save your ideas, all of which

will now be on premise when you go and ship content.

Second, we're going to take another pass

at the same language, but with greater intention.

We're going to think of the logical questions to ask,

the A in arc, which emerge from what you're reading.

So these questions as you're reading

your narrative argument, it might be,

hey, I keep saying you have to teach the market how to buy you.

I keep saying that phrase.

What does that actually mean?

Teach the market how to buy you?

Well, what are the steps to educate the market?

What does it look like when done well versus poorly?

All these logical questions emerge.

Or I might say, hey, I came up with this term

in this narrative argument for my premise.

I called it the category conundrum.

This is the central problem that my ideal audience

runs into in building their business.

They've created categories for themselves,

or they use internal jargon,

or they're very innovative type leaders or thinkers.

They create something I called the category conundrum.

Well, what do I mean by that?

I need to define it crisply.

What causes the category conundrum?

What are the symptoms?

Is it a spectrum that I can visualize?

Is it a two by two matrix?

Or can I just describe maybe a moment

that they arrive to this conundrum?

Is this something I can flesh out further

through multiple angles?

Or maybe you're saying, okay,

I'm reading this language I have.

I keep saying you're an innovative leader

not a commodified competitor.

Do those terms actually work?

Do people care about being an innovative leader?

Do these terms resonate with anybody?

Do I need better labels?

Hey, what are the differences?

Can I define them?

Okay, that's an arc.

I'm gonna go explore these two terms.

So for all my clients,

this part of the exercise is really engaging

because you're like interrogating your own thinking

first by just saving any ideas that get sparked.

And then second by asking those piercing questions,

but you're reviewing the language that we've developed

and then saving these ideas

which are immediately cohesive and coherent

to your whole platform.

You show up and refine your thinking later

but also own your ideas in the market.

And this usually leads to a few different

common types of ideas for content.

You'll write posts that define words you always repeat.

You'll anticipate objections from the audience.

You'll create branded terminology to name a problem

or name a solution.

You'll sketch out visual frameworks

like a spectrum or a pyramid or a two by two matrix.

And then you can maybe use those later in content,

in speeches, in diagnostic engagements

with your clientele.

And of course, the fifth category is you'll share stories,

stories of others, personal anecdotes,

metaphors from your life, quick examples,

you'll start sharing stories.

So that's the first and second steps to create your own arc.

First, just read what you have in front of you.

It could be internal, it could be public already.

And then save any ideas that that sparks,

passages that you want to explore in detail

or ideas that emerge from what you're reading.

Do that first.

Second, now be more intentional

and ask the logical next questions

that emerge from what you're reading.

Now you have all these ideas.

Okay, third, go create content to refine your thinking,

lifting from those ideas you've saved.

Over two or more weeks, write, record,

and post multiple pieces,

exploring those questions and ideas

that we've previously unearthed

from your premise language.

This might be articles that you publish,

which are great for hyperlinking to them

in future pieces, sending directly to prospects or clients

and any kind of SEO or AEO that you might think about.

Not something I think about, search engines and AI results,

but you might think about it too.

While having those articles on your site

and consistently exploring similar ideas,

that's only gonna help you.

So that's articles published on your own site.

And then social posts that you post natively to the feed,

that's gonna be useful for discoverability,

audience engagement, but here's the little caveat

to the social stuff.

It's worth saying this out loud,

that early in your journey to understand your premise,

you're mostly writing as thinking.

You're writing to clarify things to yourself

or recording things to clarify them to yourself.

The audience feedback loop that you get is secondary,

but still useful.

And then over time, you wanna see more engagement

or at least start to get higher caliber comments

or higher caliber connections

because your ideas get progressively more validated and proven

and now you want it to be more like distribution and connection,

not pure premise development.

So at first, your content is mostly for you.

You have to get out of your head and into the world

and figure out what you're saying

so you can say it everywhere in a way that actually resonates

and then the audience feedback loop

starts to matter a little bit more later.

But in both cases, things you published to your site,

things you published to your social channels,

you'll cycle through all the possible pieces and posts

relating to that single arc, which is rooted

in your initial questions and your very on-premise ideas.

So that's the third step.

First, read the language, save ideas.

Second, read the language again, save questions.

Be more intentional, ask those logical follow-on questions

and third, create content.

Now finally, at the end of that two or three or four-week period,

consider if anything is worth codifying into IP.

There are different categories that you might want to think

about to have coverage.

What terminology did you either create

or redefine your way?

What how to or how to think advice can you repeat?

What frameworks do you own?

Is there a diagnostic framework?

Do you have a visual in mind?

Is it just a list or an acronym?

What frameworks do you have to package and clarify your thinking?

And then what stories have you collected?

Do you have big macro-level stories about individuals

that sound like your audience?

Where end to end, you can tell their story of transformation.

Do you have really short examples?

Do you have personal anecdotes?

Do you have metaphors?

Lots I can say on stories, but for now,

I think about those categories.

You have a premise and then there's

four other types of IP, terminology, advice, frameworks,

and stories.

So that's the final stage.

Can you codify anything from your previous two

three-week period from the arc into IP?

And then you move on to the next arc.

Now fair warning, if you're excited about the prospect

of like a more focused and intentional approach to content.

Here's the warning.

Discipline is required.

This stuff only works if you focus, focus, focus.

I don't want to hear that you're easily distractable

as a person.

I don't want to hear that you've got writer's block.

You can pick a focus in theory in your mind,

but then clarity is built through communicating to the world.

We need to move forward with a stated intention.

We start with focus, but we create clarity.

We write and speak messily, even though it doesn't

feel great right now, because eventually, it will.

Most people never experience that because most people stray

from their focus, which means they never achieve clarity,

never develop IP, and never experience

the very addicting feeling of momentum,

once your ideas have actually been well developed

and content starts to flow more easily.

There is no substitute for the messy part.

The only way around is through.

We pick our focus in theory, but we have to go create clarity.

Don't stray.

Don't tell me, oh, I'm a just distractable person.

Oh, I've got writer's block.

The only way around is through.

Now another way to think about this.

If you had a train ticket for this Wednesday at 8 a.m.,

you're going to get on a train at Wednesday at 8 a.m.,

if you had a ticket to that train,

you would find a way to get on the train.

That's your content practice.

It's Wednesday at 8 a.m., that's why I ship.

Not because I feel inspired, not because I have nothing else

to do, not because everything the night before

was running well or the world, the news,

like how I feel, no, you state your intention

and you stick to it.

If you had a ticket for a train at Wednesday at 8 a.m.,

you would be on it because you said you would

and only because it is now your time.

The train is leaving, get on it.

So commit a couple of weeks to one arc.

Don't jump around to topics randomly.

Focus, focus, focus.

Publish a few pieces per arc.

You might need multiple attempts to crack the code

on your ideas and actually codify your thinking

into IP at the end.

Don't just move on.

Don't just keep checking boxes and filling feeds.

Do a little reflection.

Consider what needs to be developed

from that last two to three week period

into a reusable asset and then go ahead and publish that too.

The temptation is going to be to say things like this,

like, oh, I should talk about that latest trend

I'm seeing in my space or the latest viral news or meme.

No, stay on your arc at least at first.

You need evergreen IP, not random spikes of engagement

that die and never lead to real revenue.

Later, you can press any kind of trendy thing

through the lens of your premise

because you've internalized your ideas to such a degree

that you can now color everything through that lens.

But for now, stay on the arc.

Don't let what is new, what is flashy,

what is trending, cause you to stride.

Another temptation is to say, well, I have this other idea.

Great.

Add it to a notebook for safekeeping, pursue it later.

Or maybe you think, I'm starting to get repetitive

in this arc.

Yeah, that's awesome because that's when you and others

both start to internalize your ideas.

You should be repeating yourself

or exploring the same idea in multiple ways

by asking good follow up questions about that idea.

And by the way, if you need a prescription

for how you shape a single arc,

here's what I would suggest you try.

Start with a long form piece

to explore the first big question or idea.

Create three to five social posts after that

and then end with another long form piece.

So you kind of bookend this two to three week span

with two essays, two pieces on your site.

And then in between, you explore other questions,

you remix the initial essays, you go on a journey

and the social media world in between your two pillar essays.

So that's how I'd recommend shaping this arc.

For that first long form piece, don't judge it.

Don't worry if it's really long.

Don't worry if in that piece

you have multiple ideas emerging that you think

that they might deserve their own pieces

or even their own arcs later.

Great, save that ear market.

Just create an earnest first attempt,

a first essay, a first newsletter edition,

a first attempt to understand or explore something

that emerges from your premise language,

right and speak from the heart to create that first piece.

Then for the social posts, three to five after that,

lift them from the initial long form piece if it's easier,

but ideally you won't just repurpose that article.

You will ask the natural follow up questions

or come up with the natural follow up ideas

from the first article and explore them natively

to a social feed.

And then you'll end with kind of a wrap-up of the arc.

This is the book end to it.

And it could be a revision of the first piece

because now you actually have clarity

when you didn't at first or you can look ahead

and ask questions like, so what now?

Like what we've learned is this,

so what does that mean moving forward?

What's next?

That could be the final article.

For example, in an arc about the word resonance,

I might begin by trying to define the term,

but then I would end by finally being able to explain

the relationship between resonance

and what most people think about reach.

And of course, in that final piece,

I would pull forward and reuse the definition

from the first piece because it's part of my IP, right?

Or maybe I'll end that same arc with a visual spectrum

to explain something that I was exploring

the last couple of weeks.

Or maybe I'll flesh out a quick example

that I happened upon when I was writing

and speaking those couple of weeks.

It was a quick example that rolled off the tongue.

Okay, great.

Now I'm gonna flesh that out into a complete signature story

for my final piece.

Regardless, I'm gonna end this two to three week arc

with another second long form piece

to kind of cap it off and bookend it

with social posts in between.

So that's one prescriptive shape of an arc.

Start with a long form piece,

publish a few short form posts natively to social media

and then end with another long form piece.

But I would recommend you make it your own

whatever it feels right to you.

So focus is a strategic advantage.

We know that.

Writing is thinking.

We've heard that content can be both distribution

for proven ideas and also a means

to work out even stronger thoughts.

We've heard these ideas before,

but when it comes to executing against them,

we often trip or fall.

So remember to think and publish in arcs.

Ask the logical questions based on previous content,

existing messaging or your distinct and onable premise.

Refine your ideas through active exploration and creation.

It's the best way to find clarity

and to sharpen your words

and also build an audience along the way.

And then finally, codify the strongest bits and ideas

as you package your expertise into reusable elements

of thought leadership, your IP, branded terms,

teachable methods, frameworks, stories and more.

In three to six months, if you just commit

to doing it this way, three to six months,

you'll have developed and validated

and internalized your premise.

You'll have built significant IP

that you can reuse everywhere,

elevating your impact everywhere you have to communicate.

And you will help orient your audience

and grow an audience around certain key themes.

And by the way, by making it this focused

and making it this clear,

you will equip those fans with reusable language,

language that they can go and use

to win you more fans for free.

Whether you count that as a social follower,

a newsletter subscriber, a prospect,

a client, a customer or user, you name it.

Just like you, those fans will emerge

with better, more memorable and more repeatable language

that they can use to distribute your message for you.

When it comes to your content,

we're not using it to check boxes.

We're not using it to fill feeds.

We're not creating content for content's sake.

We're using content as a thinking tool

and IP development system.

No more guessing, no more hoping,

stop filling feeds and start owning your ideas.

Thank you so much for listening.

Obviously, I talked a lot about the work

that I do with clients in this one.

This is one exercise of deploying what we first developed.

If you don't know, my business has shifted

over the last three years.

You know, people might know me as someone

who gives speeches and writes books and host shows,

but for the last few years,

I've been working with my clients

and I've been working with my clients

and I've been working with my clients

and I've been working with my clients

and I've been working with my clients

in an advisory capacity one-on-one.

These are executives, entrepreneurs, creators,

experts, authors of some time.

I help them win better and more opportunities

by going on this journey from competent to resonant.

I help you transform your thinking into those clear,

captivating ideas, your premise, and surrounding IP,

and of course, your signature speeches and stories.

The goal is to help you stop chasing attention

and become the one that others seek.

You can learn more and book an exploratory call

with me at jaconzo.com.

I take on very few clients at any given time

in order to work deeply with you

as that peer-level practitioner advisor,

not a coach with a bunch of templates.

This is about competing on the impact of your ideas,

not the volume of your marketing,

but that requires premise and IP development,

message clarity and differentiation,

and I think public speaking and storytelling excellence.

If I can help you in any way,

give me a shout.

Don't market more, matter more.

Think resonance, overreach, and I'll see you next time.

Bye-bye.