​​🎧 Listen to the podcast version of this email here​.​​
Most people create in isolation.
They sit behind a laptop, creating stuff based on the assumption that they know what their audience needs, what they’re struggling with, and what will be useful to them.
Sometimes they’re right.
Often, they’re guessing.
And here’s the problem with that.
If you look at the same materials, on the same platforms, from the same people as everyone else, you’ll probably end up with the same conclusions, the same insights, and the same solutions as everyone else too.
That’s how everything starts to sound the same.
Last week, I talked about being sharp. About speaking to specific people with specific problems, instead of trying to be relevant to everyone at once.
But if you really want to be sharp, you need better insight.
And if you want better insight, you need to go where your competitors don’t.
You need to get closer to the people you want to help.
That’s where this tool comes in.
Years ago, when I worked at an innovation agency, we used a simple way to get under the skin of the people we were trying to understand.
I’ve used it ever since because it simply works.
It comes down to this:
Spend time learning about your audience, spend time with your audience, and spend time being your audience.
🛠️ Let's start with about
This is the stuff you can find from your desk. Articles, comments, Youtube videos, podcasts, LinkedIn posts, etc.
All the things you can read, watch, scan, and collect while sitting behind your laptop.
AI can help you ask better questions, look in different corners, and spot things you might have missed.
This all vert useful, but this is also where most people stop.
Because it’s safe.
You can stay in your little workspace, do your research, collect your notes on a Notion board, and feel like you understand the audience.
It's also what your competitors are doing.
However, the next two are where the interesting stuff happens.
🛠️ Spend time with them
Talk to them. Ask a few questions.
Pay attention to how they describe their problems, where they get stuck, what they struggle to explain, and which words they naturally use.
Often, the way someone describes a problem is more useful than the polished version we would have written for them.
That’s where patterns start to show up.
You hear the same frustration a few times. The same hesitation. The same throwaway comment that clearly means more than they realise.
That’s the good stuff.
Now, the next one most people skip.
🛠️ Being them
Step into their situation as much as you can.
If you, for instance, help people create videos, don’t use your own setup. Use what they have.
A phone. A laptop. No fancy lights. No proper microphone. No expensive editing software. No perfectly quiet room.
Try creating something that way and you might immediately start to feel the friction.
The hesitation before pressing record. The awkwardness of hearing your own voice. The small technical things that make the whole thing feel harder than it should.
That’s where useful insights come from.
You notice things you would never see from a distance. The small frustrations, the repeated questions, the gaps nobody is really addressing.
This is what helps your content, your offer, and your message land with the right people using language they use.
So what do you do with this then?
Think about the audience you’re trying to help and create at least one activity in each of the three buckets.
- One way to learn about them.
- One way to spend time with them.
- One way to try being them.
For about them, send a simple three-question survey to a few people who fit the audience. Email it, DM it, or ask the questions in a quick call, which leads nicely into the next one.
For with them, maybe you call a few people who fit the profile, interview someone properly, ask better questions, follow them around or just observe how they actually work.
For being them, simulate their situation as much as you can. Use the tools they use. Work with the constraints they have. Give yourself their budget, their time limit, or their lack of equipment.
Bit of creative role-play helps here.
This is how this has worked in action:
I once worked with a client in Indonesia who believed their products were great value for money.
So instead of debating it in a meeting room, we gave them the same weekly budget their consumers had and asked them to live with that constraint for a week.
Turns out their products didn’t feel cheap after all.
That’s the kind of insight you don’t get from a spreadsheet.
So pick one activity in each bucket and give it a go this week, so you can stop guessing and start seeing what others miss.
Now go make it a great day.
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