The fluid secretion test
Don't overcomplicate the fundamentals
Creators have many metrics that aren’t exactly relevant.
It’s easy to get lost in vanity metrics and miss the bottom line. It’s equally easy to chase goals for the sake of proving things to others rather than the sake of doing our best work.
YouTubers constantly talk about their subscribers but this can mean nada if their new videos aren’t engaging.
You can go into the anal details of watch time, comments and likes which are important. However, these are merely giving a more accurate picture of the thing you actually want to know. Which is…
EMOTION
Does my content make people feel something?
Excitement, intrigue, happiness, fear, disgust or sadness.
Everything that gets watched, read or listened to needs to create emotions in people.
I worked for an Emotion analytics company understanding every emotion consumers felt during content. We helped the biggest media companies in the world like BBC and Twitch improve their content with this emotion data.
What do you need to know?
With this obsession with emotion, I thought about what the 80-20 version of this would be for creators?
The best content has those moments where emotions surge within us in an overwhelming rush that make us feel alive. Is there a way that creators can test for epic moments and use that as a goal?
I realised there is only one framework you need.
You don’t need to pay anyone for a survey and you don’t need to mine data.
You simply need to know one thing.
Does it make people secrete fluids?
Think about it.
The work that defines an artist is so powerful that some fluid or other will come out:
Crying with laughter or sadness or happiness
Sweating in fear or rage or anticipation
Spitting in disgust or surprise
Coughing in shock or denial
Peeing yourself because you can’t breathe from laughing
Snorting your coffee all over your desk/clothes/friends/boss
Orgasm from (well it’s not just porn that turns people on and I’ll leave it at that)
When you truly touch someone deeply, their body physically reacts.
Fluid secretion is undeniably the leading indicator of brilliance.
So if you are an artist. Those are your goals.
Fuck the algorithms.
Fuck the numbers.
Relentlessly focus on making people very very wet.
