Simple, Novel, Emotional: The Shareability Formula
Make it simple, make it show something new, make it feel something — then cut the cleverness.
- Difficulty
- Moderate
- Time to result
- ~days to results
- Steps
- 4
- Confidence
- 83%
A content-design rule for creating widely shareable pieces: aim for work that is instantly simple to digest, reveals something the viewer hasn't thought of, and triggers an emotion — while ruthlessly trimming complexity, because clever multi-layer ideas lose short attention spans. Use it when making charts, posts, or any content meant to spread.
Origin
Michelle's charts get stolen and reshared constantly because of how shareable they are. Asked why they go viral, she names three attributes — simple/quick, shows something new, makes you feel something — and warns that her natural 'overthinking' brain makes charts too clever, requiring Lenny to strip layers so the idea is graspable at a glance.
Core principles
- 01Simple and quick beats comprehensive — short attention spans reward instant digestibility.
- 02Show the viewer something they haven't thought of before.
- 03Make them feel something.
- 04Too clever is a failure mode: cut layers until one idea lands immediately.
How to run it
- 1
Compress to instant simplicity
Make the piece readable and understandable in seconds; assume the audience won't invest effort to decode it.
Pro tip Simple also means less physical labor to produce — a win on both ends.
- 2
Deliver a fresh insight
Ensure it shows something the viewer hasn't seen framed this way before — novelty is what makes it worth sharing.
- 3
Trigger an emotion
Aim for a laugh, a pang of recognition, or a feeling — emotion is the second lever beyond novelty.
- 4
Strip the cleverness
Audit for over-layered ideas. If understanding it requires holding several nested concepts, remove layers until one clear idea remains.
Pro tip Have a simplicity-minded editor (Lenny plays this role for Michelle) flag when it's 'too many layers you have to understand.'
Watch out Your own overthinking will push toward too-clever; that instinct is the enemy of shareability.
In the wild
A chart Michelle never even shared went viral because someone photographed a page of her book — a low-quality phone photo — and it spread on its own simplicity and emotional hit.
→ Proof that raw shareability, not production polish or distribution, drove the spread.
Michelle's charts are sometimes 'too clever... too many layers you have to understand,' so Lenny pushes to 'simplify it a little bit' before they land.
→ Simplified versions read cleanly and travel; the over-clever originals stall.
Common mistakes
Over-layering the idea
An overthinking creator packs 'this, then oh this, then this' into one piece; audiences with short attention spans bounce off the complexity.
Optimizing for polish over shareability
A crude phone photo of a page went viral — proof the shareable core matters more than production quality or channel.
Is it for you?
Best for
Chart-makers, meme-format creators, and marketers producing content meant to be reshared organically.
Not ideal for
Dense technical explainers or reference material where completeness legitimately outweighs instant simplicity.
From the transcript
“what I like to make is things that are really simple and quick and show you something you haven't thought of before”
“if it makes them feel something is another thing”
“People like it when it's really simple.”
“they're like too clever sometimes and I feel like cuz it's your point, people have a short attention span”
From the episode
How I built a 1M+ subscriber newsletter and top 10 tech podcast
Lenny Rachitsky