Category: Communication

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Listening Through the Noise

Signal to Noise Still Life

The shouting match that is the current incarnation of the internet leads us to the unavoidable question: why listen better when the signal to noise ratio is so bad? I am using “listen” figuratively here … online we “listen” to others by reading … but the principle holds.

I might want to back up and explain what a signal-to-noise-ratio is …

Well, it compares the level of a desired signal to the level of background noise. Too much noise drowns out the signal. Kinda like trying to listen to an AM radio station (remember those?) during an electrical storm. Or trying to have a conversation in one of those God-forsaken conference centers that infest all of our major cities.

Most often, signal-to-noise ratio (SNR or S/N in the technical literature) is used to describe the quality of radio broadcast – or narrowcast – transmissions. It is also used to describe how clean the sound is in audio equipment. Or the picture in video.

The amount of useful content available online is amazing. Unfortunately, it is often buried under a mountain of relatively useless, repetitious SEO-enhanced drivel. Search engines try to cut through the fog of noise for us, but there are no guarantees that what ends up on the first page of a search is anything like what would be most useful.

Spending time/energy to learn to “listen” better seems a waste when the quality of the content is low – or drowned out by nonsense.

Actually, it is precisely now that better listening is needed.

Arguably, the internet would be markedly improved if people spent more time “listening” and less time “talking.” A groundswell in that direction would automatically reduce the amount of noise in the environment.

Be the signal, not the noise.

More anon …

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Listening

I have been doing a lot of thinking about listening lately. Both literal and figurative. It seems to me that we don’t do very much of it. Neither literally nor figuratively.

That is not (only) because there is little worth listening to … the signal-to-noise ratio on the internet continues its decay. Its accelerating decay – which just means that everybody shouts louder to be ignored by more people.

But there are things worth hearing; worth listening to. Even on the internet.

Finding them is proving to be more and more challenging, but that is where aggregators and curators come in … find one whose taste mirrors your own and you will have a better experience online.

The Conversation: Pierre-Auguste Renoir [Public domain]
Conversation

Importantly, from a marketing perspective, according to Seth Godin (among others), listening is a crucial skill. In fact, it is more important to listen well than to shout – no matter how eloquently – into the maelstrom that is the contemporary internet. If you listen well to the people that you hope to serve then you will know what problems they need to have solved. You will also know what they have tried before and what has worked and what has not. You will know better what to offer and what they will be willing to accept. And how they will value your offer.

Interesting, then, is the fact that most of us have never been taught to listen well. We aim to fix that.

More anon …