Newsletter #17: A lesson about audiences from The Lord of the Rings
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A little while back, my spirit was flagging due to the devastating economical and social damage caused by worldwide lockdowns in the name of a virus with a greater than 99% survival rate*. And though I tend to get feisty when governments encroach on civil liberties, what really brought me down was reading a transcript of a speech from David Beasley, the executive director of the UN World Food Programme.
He said, “The World Food Programme analysis shows that, due to the Coronavirus, an additional 130 million people could be pushed to the brink of starvation by the end of 2020.”
This speech was from way back in April and, as we know, many COVID predictions have been very wrong. But even if this prediction was 100% wrong, the normal state of affairs is that “135 million people on earth are marching towards the brink of starvation.”
Some people can be productive members of society despite a flagging spirit but I’m afraid I’m not one of them. I needed a lift. A reminder that good trumps evil and that hope is never lost.
I turned to my DVD shelf.
I dragged my fingers across Absolutely Fabulous, seven seasons of The Golden Girls, the entire series of Northern Exposure and even Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt.
When they landed on the boxed set (extended versions!) of The Lord of the Rings, I pulled it down and prepared myself for six nights of intensive therapy.
By the time Frodo [SPOILER ALERT!] stepped on the boat headed for Valinor, I felt more settled but not quite back to my old self.
I looked at the DVDs again.
This boxed set comes with two special features discs per movie. In the many years we’ve owned this set, I’ve only ever watched a few of the special features. Didn’t want to ruin the magic maybe?
But I was drawn to them and so I dug into another week of LOTR therapy.
Pretty soon I realized that these special features didn’t take away from the magic—they added to it. There was no “good enough” during the planning and execution of these movies. No detail was too small to agonize over. And these people, the cast and crew, really seemed to love the job and each other, though there were references to stress and difficulties keeping up with family responsibilities.
At one point of the special features, someone (possibly producer, Rick Porras) said that they had to make the movies work for people who had never read the book and make it work for fans who knew the subject matter well.
This really struck me for personal and professional reasons.
On the personal side, I saw they achieved half their goal with me. I didn’t even read the books until after watching The Fellowship of the Ring. And while there are die-hard book fans who took issue with some decisions made by the movie team, the trilogy was wildly successful at the box office. I can’t say for sure, but it seems like they created a product that both newbies and Tolkien scholars could love.
On a professional level, it made me think about thought leaders (who are often specialists) sharing their knowledge. I recently met a woman who’s been in the benefits industry for 15 years. She said if she spoke to non-benefits people the way she talks to benefits people, they wouldn’t know what she was talking about.
Kind of like when Stephen Colbert gets going on Lord of the Rings trivia.
If you’re a thought leader with specialist knowledge, you’ll be better able to connect with your audience if you take the Lord of the Rings movie approach and tailor your message to your known double audience. Of course, there are some exceptions to this rule that you may want to apply.
For example, if you’re writing an article for an industry publication—read by your fellow experts and peers—you can throw around terms like target loss ratio, incurred but not reported and pooling without taking the time to define them. These folks will know those specialist terms, like a Lord of the Rings scholar knows how old Gollum/Sméagol is when he [SPOILER ALERT!] meets his demise.
However, if you’re writing something for clients and prospects and you mention pooling, it’s probably best to explain it in plain language and throw in a simple example to show how this concept affects the folks who are paying for the benefits plan. Even if you think they should already know it.
Just like the movie makers had to explain the history of the rings of power in in the first five minutes of The Fellowship of the Ring. Without this context (and many other examples), newbies would’ve been lost and wouldn’t have turned into raving fans.
Peter Jackson, the director of the Lord of the Rings trilogy, spent $281 million making these movies. They put so much care into them, including always thinking about what’s best for the story and audience. Was that the right thing to do? Well, I can’t say for sure, but the trilogy brought in $2.981 billion in worldwide receipts and won 17 Academy Awards.
So … the Lord of the Rings approach to resonating with your audience(s) seems legit.
What do you think?
Until next time, keep on truckin’,
Andrea
PS: You might wonder what I did to reconcile the news of those extra millions of starving people. I started monthly donations to two more free presses, The Highwire and Rebel News. Because the more people know about the real devastation of these lockdowns, the more people will speak out. And I’m terribly sorry for shifting my references from epic movies to epic TV but as Maya Angelou once told Oprah Winfrey, “When you know better, you do better.”
*Scroll over to the 1 hour, 26-minute mark of the link to see Del Bigtree break down the CDC number of 0.26% and how that calculates to risk across age groups.
Comic relief
The Carol Burnett Show - Tough Truckers
Here’s a six-minute video of Harvey Korman, Tim Conway and Vicki Lawrence in a diner showing us that appearances can be deceiving. Real laughs.
Epic tunes
Harry Styles - Sign of The Times (in the Live Lounge)
My little goddaughter appreciated Harry Styles years before I did. I only became a fan a few months ago. The first time I heard this song, I was like, “Oh, I know this, what is this?” Except I didn’t know it. To me, this young whippersnapper makes music that feels like home.
Notes from the Rebel Alliance
Rocco Galati is a constitutional lawyer who takes the government to task when it violates what the Department of Justice calls “the supreme law of Canada.” Rocco’s a real firecracker who was heavily influenced by his father who was court-marshalled (twice!) for refusing to fight for Benito Mussolini who was, at the time, Italy’s leader of the National Fascist Party.
In 2020, Rocco is taking on multiple levels of government over constitutional violations in relation to COVID measures. Legal proceedings against Justin Trudeau, Rob Ford, John Tory, the CBC (and others) have begun.
(Rocco links to the whole statement of claim filed in the Ontario Superior Court here, in case you want to read the 191 pages.)
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