Web Design Ireland

Remember Sesame Street? Yep me too. As do millions of other people around the world. Sesame street was *the* pioneer of educational television and the best known and longest running kids program in the world.

So how does something like Sesame street become soo popular, and so recognised - and become part of everyday pop culture? And more importantly what does it teach us about content and blogging?

Was it that the characters in the show were easily recognised by Adults and Children alike? 
Was it that Jim Henson’s muppets characters just became popular on their own?

No. It was none of these things.

The reasons for Sesame Streets success was twofold.

Firstly the show’s content was amazing and secondly the producers of it were tireless in their efforts in using A / B testing. They approached the shows development scientifically.

Before the show got off the ground, the medium of T.V. for kids was thought to be very much a passive thing. With an Audience aimed at 3-6 year olds, it was thought that kids simply enjoyed movement, colours and shapes on screen, and that was as much stimuli as could be received. Thanks to Sesame Street, that myth was debunked we now know that kids can gain much more education from such a show provided that the format was correct, and that interaction with content was happening.

Its a relatively unknown fact that one of Sesame streets reasons for success was that it was the subject of rigorous testing. 

Child Psychologists were involved in developing both the content for the showing, and proving that it was working in educating children.

So how was this done?

With every show that was released - the psychologists sat a child down in front of the t.v, and beside the television offered a slideshow of moving imagery, rotating at regular intervals containing engaging child related content. If at any moment during Sesame street the child became uninterested in the show (or in other words didn’t understand the content)- they would be drawn to the Slideshow.

A chart was drawn up to illustrate the dips and peaks throughout the show, and any content which caused large periods of dips in engagement, would be dropped.

And how does this relate to blogging?

1). Content Development.

Develop content around your visitors. Find out where your dips of visitor engagement lie, and adjust your content accordingly. Which posts do your visitors comment on? Which ones are they engaging with you on? All of these things are vital in understanding your Audience.

2). Scientific A/B testing.

What if you were to run two slightly different landing pages for your RSS subscribers? What impact would that have?

All of these test were run at Sesame street to see what content held their visitors attention for long periods of time. They approached this scientifically. In fact some much so that the show enjoyed engagment rates of 85-90% with their audience.

3). Find a comfort zone

Understanding your audience is vital. Firstly because it allows you to write content with them in mind, (yes Phil that photography post was for you) - and it makes sure that they spend longer on your site. If you were to map out a chart of when your visitors leave, what impact would that have on your website statistics?

4). Don’t overload your visitors with stimuli

Its not all about the flashing lights and fancy graphics. That’s not what holds a childs attention, so why should it hold an adults attention? Kill the spinning logos, and animated banners.

5). Work on lowering your bounce rate.

Sesame Street Psycologist worked tirelessly on lowering their bounce rate for the show.  With a bit of work, and monitoring of your website statistics you can too - and maybe (just maybe) end up with a site which is headed for Sesame Street success.