Why won’t that ridiculous urban legend about kidney kidnappers ever die?

There are several good reasons, all of them instructive for those of us who spend our days trying to craft engaging content and messages with staying power. You can learn the key to the kidney legend, and a bunch of other strategies for developing riveting ideas, in a useful new book:  Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Some Die.

Following their own advice, authors Chip and Dan Heath explore six basic principles of stickiness in an entertaining string of practical, surprising, authoritative, and, yes, memorable case studies, exercises, and guidelines. Some highlights:

• When searching for a powerful example, check the possibilities using the "Frank Sinatra test."
• Did you know that the "curse of knowledge" threatens to doom your
  article, your headline, your presentation, the title of your book, the
  organization of your Web site, and pretty much anything else you’re
  trying to put across to an audience?
• Assignment: Using Bambi as your focus, develop an unforgettable message about the low risk of shark attacks.

(Visit the Made to Stick site for a generous excerpt, which includes the kidney caper.)

We’re putting Made to Stick on our bookshelf next to that other indispensable little guide about compelling communication by Strunk and White. We’ve nicknamed the Heath brothers’ new volume "The Elements of Stickiness."