# lens-curiosity-packaging

**Lens mode.** Source authority: MrBeast-era retention frameworks — pattern interrupt, tension, payoff.

## When to use

Use when the deliverable lives or dies on the *opening half-second*. YouTube titles and thumbnails, short-form video covers, podcast episode names, course-module names, anything where a scroll past = a permanent loss. Trigger this lens when the brief says "people aren't clicking" or "good content, bad packaging."

## Procedure

1. **Name what is interesting first.** Strip the asset to one sentence: *what is the most curious thing inside?* Not the topic. The hook beat. If the most curious thing is the topic itself, the asset is under-baked — flag it.
2. **Find the gap.** A curiosity gap is the distance between *what the reader can guess* and *what is actually true*. If a reader can predict the body from the title, the gap is zero. Widen it: name an outcome without the cause, name a cause without the outcome, name a category without naming the answer.
3. **Frame the transformation.** What state does the reader move *from* and *to*? "Beginner to confident in 30 days" is a transformation; "tips for beginners" is a topic. The packaging works when the transformation is the unspoken promise of the title.
4. **Sketch the visual concept.** Even pure-text channels need a mental picture. One concrete image, one tension element (contrast, scale, surprise). The image is what the reader's brain caches before the click.
5. **Draft 5 titles.** Each one a different angle on the same curiosity gap — never five rephrasings of the same line. Mix at least three of: number-led, contrast-led, outcome-led, "the one thing" framing, named-identity framing.
6. **Build a kill list.** Three to five titles you considered and rejected, with a one-line reason each ("too clever," "gap unclosable," "promises a number we don't have"). The kill list disciplines future iterations.

End every output with this exact contract:

**PACKAGING:**
- Curiosity gap: ...
- Transformation frame: ...
- Visual concept: ...
- 5 title options: ...
- Kill list: ...

## Decision rules

- **Use this lens when attention is the bottleneck**, not when conviction is. If the reader already clicked, packaging is the wrong fix — they need a clarity or value pass.
- **Bigger gap is not always better.** Gaps must be closable in the body. A title that promises more than the asset delivers earns one click and zero trust.
- **Specificity beats spectacle.** "I sent 47 cold emails in one Saturday" beats "I sent INSANE amounts of cold email." Concrete numbers do the curiosity work.
- **One transformation per asset.** If the packaging implies two outcomes, the reader picks neither.
- **Skip this lens for most-aware audiences.** They came to act, not to be intrigued. Packaging gets in the way.

## Anti-patterns

- **Impersonation.** Writing "MrBeast-style" titles by copying surface mannerisms (all caps, "I", emoji). The discipline is gap engineering, not the costume.
- **Clickbait gaps the body cannot close.** Promising a number, a secret, or a turnaround the asset does not contain. Earns one click; loses the next ten.
- **Topic dressed as transformation.** "How to write better emails" is a topic. "The first sentence that doubled my reply rate" is a transformation. One reads as homework; the other reads as a payoff.
- **Five rephrasings of one title.** If all five options share the same noun, verb, and number, you wrote one title with five hats.
- **Curiosity without stakes.** A gap that resolves in a yawn ("you won't believe which fonts I like") is not a gap, it is filler.

## Before / after

**Brief:** Title a 12-minute video on rebuilding a landing page that wasn't converting.

**Before:**
> *How I improved my landing page conversion rate*

Topic, no gap, no transformation, no image.

**After:**
> *I deleted 80% of my landing page. Conversion tripled.*

Visual concept: a wireframe with most blocks crossed out. Transformation: bloated → minimal. Gap: which 80%? The reader has to click to find out, and the body can close the gap honestly.
