“Engagement” is a hot topic when it comes to digital content, but there is one aspect of engagement that I hardly ever see addressed:
Incompleteness.
Part of the dynamics of media operates this way:
The more information is provided to you, the more passive the media consumption experience is.
The more is left out, the more participatory, or engaging, the experience becomes because the audience is forced to “fill-in” the gaps themselves.
Consider watching a film vs reading a book.
When watching a film, both the story and the creative, imaginative elements are provided for you, which makes it a very passive, sit-back-and-relax kind of experience.
On the other hand, a book is more of a lean-in kind of experience because you have to fill in the gaps between the ideas represented in the words and the implied reality. (Not to mention the manual engagement of physically turning the pages as opposed to a film which plays all the way through on its own.)
For one more example, consider watching a video on a topic you are interested in, and the person speaking leaves out a point that you think is very important. You are much more likely to feel the need to respond in some way and fill that gap than if every point was sufficiently touched on.
This principle applies in many other situations as well, so think of ways you can intentionally leave something out to make your content more engaging.
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P.S. If you want to read more about this idea, Marshall McLuhan codified it with his discussion of “hot” and “cold” media in his book Understanding Media.
