So if you actually want people to listen:
1️⃣ Start with tension - a question, not a list.
2️⃣ Open a loop - make them feel the gap.
3️⃣ Pay it off - don’t leave them hanging.
Because curiosity doesn’t distort truth.
It delivers it - in a way that makes people want to hear it.
Tension first.
Truth later.
That’s how attention works - in business, storytelling, and life.
That’s the Curiosity Gap.
When something’s unresolved, attention locks in. George Loewenstein found curiosity peaks the moment we realise we don’t know something ... meaning the fastest way to make people care is to stop answering questions they haven’t asked yet.
And before anyone shouts “clickbait!” ... relax.
Clickbait is cheap tension with no payoff.
Curiosity is earned tension with a promised answer.
Clickbait lies to you.
Curiosity invites you.
I was just interviewed on the BBC about this. They asked whether it was a good a advertisement. I said "We are talking about a German crane company on the BBC evening news. I think that question answers itself"!