Bruce Springsteen once said that his goal is to overwhelm his audience in the first five minutes of his concerts.
After that, he says, he’s got them for the rest of the night.
I can verify this. I have seen him perform many, many times, including in 2016 during his “The River” tour (when he was 67 years old) and on Broadway in 2021 (when he was 71), and later this year at Gillette Stadium, when he’ll be 73.
Overwhelm your audience in the first five minutes, and you’ve got them for the rest of the night.
He’s still doing it today.
The same holds true in storytelling and all of public speaking:
The opening of a story is critical to the story’s success. The beginning is where you create the wonder, mystery, and suspense that will carry your audience forward. It’s where you signal to the audience that they are in good hands. Entertainment is forthcoming. Buckle up.
Win them over in the first minute, or you risk never having them with you at all.
Similarly, Tom Petty was once asked to explain his “secret sauce” for writing so many hit songs. He said that he and his band had one simple philosophy for writing a song:
“Don’t bore us. Get to the chorus.”
Like Springsteen, Petty and his bandmates understood that you must win your audience over quickly or risk losing them forever, and one of the best ways of hooking an audience on a song is getting to that catchy, memorable chorus as quickly as possible.
Songs are not exactly stories (though they sometimes are), but when performing for audiences – in theaters, stadiums, or the boardroom – the needs are the same, even if the content is different.
Quickly convince your audience that you have something both meaningful and entertaining to say, or you won’t have an audience listening to you at all.
