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Don’t Waste Their Attention

Don’t Waste Their Attention

Matt Deseno
April 07, 2026

If you’re doing this, you’re wasting their attention.

Have you ever clicked on something that looked exactly like what you needed…

Only to land on a page that made you work for it?

You start scanning, trying to figure out what’s being offered.

Closing a pop-up, then another.

You scroll past blocks of text that feel important, but not clear enough to act on.

A few seconds pass. Then you leave.

Not because you weren’t interested.
But because it wasn’t obvious.
And it wasn’t worth the effort to figure it out.

That moment happens thousands of times a day, and most businesses never notice it.

Today in 3 minutes or less:

✔️ Attention is the Real Currency

✔️ Build Straight Lines

✔️ The Opposite Is True

✔️ What You Can Do Today

📢 Attention Is the Real Currency

We talk a lot about money in business.

Revenue. Profit. Margins.

But money is the result, not the starting point.

Before any of that shows up, something else gets spent first.

Attention.

A click is a decision.

A scroll is a decision.

Staying on your page for another ten seconds is a decision.

And those decisions are fragile.

Because attention isn’t owned, it’s loaned.

People are constantly deciding:
“Is this worth my time?”
“Is this helping me?”
Should I keep going or leave?”

And the moment the answer becomes unclear, they move on.

That’s why attention is so valuable.

Not because it’s rare, but because it’s easy to lose.

📏 Build Straight Lines

If attention is the most valuable asset in business, we don't get to waste it.

Make their time worth it.

If someone gives you five minutes, give them something they can use right now.

Not a maze.
Not five pop-ups.
Not a funnel that only serves you.

Build straight lines.

When they leave your page, they should feel ahead. Smarter and clearer.

Because if their attention doesn’t create a positive return for them, you’re not earning trust, you’re borrowing against it.

🤔 The Opposite Is True

That’s the compounding effect most people miss.

Every interaction either builds trust or quietly drains it.

And the drain isn’t obvious.

It shows up later, in lower response rates, slower decisions, colder audiences.

The opposite is true too.

When people consistently leave your content feeling clearer, a few things start to happen:

They spend more time with you.
They trust your recommendations faster.
They share what you create without being asked.

Not because you optimized a funnel, but because you respected their attention.

Clarity builds momentum, momentum builds trust, and trust is what turns attention into something that actually compounds.

💪 What You Can Do Today

You don’t need to rebuild everything. Just improve one experience.

Pick a page, an email, or an offer you’ve already created and look at it through a simple lens: Does this make it easier or harder for someone to move forward?

Then make a few small adjustments:

Remove one unnecessary step.
If someone has to click, read, or decide more than they need to, that’s friction. Reduce it.
Make the next action obvious.
Don’t make people guess what to do next. Tell them clearly and simply.
Give value before asking for anything.
A quick insight, a clear takeaway, a small win — something they can use immediately.
Shorten where you can, clarify where you can’t.
If something has to be longer, make it easier to follow. Structure creates clarity.
Test it on yourself.
If you landed on your own page for the first time, would you move forward… or leave?

You don’t need more traffic.

You need to make better use of the attention you already have.

Because attention isn’t just something you capture. It’s something you need to use responsibly.

THOUGHTS ON TODAY'S MARGIN MAKERS?

To profiting more and working less. 💸

-Matt

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