If you think of a learning experience like user experience, there are performance metrics. I might call them Developer Learning Vitals. I see Time to Mind Blown as one of these vitals.

Let's say you're doing a workshop on your product and the room is full of people who don't know about it yet – you're driving awareness.

Now, imagine a browser profiling timeline.

Imagine each person listening as a separate track on the timeline.

Start the learning profiler. Watch as the playhead advances over time as you are teaching during the workshop.

Now, wait and see how long it takes for what you're saying to click in your audience's mind – you'll see it reflected outwardly.

That's Time to Mind Blown. It's the time from the start of the experience to the moment when someone first gets your value proposition. In a developer or prospect's learning journey, this occurs during the "awareness" stage – and without it, it's unlikely they'll proceed further because they won't understand that your product is for them.

How can you recognize the moment?

If you're in person, you could know if they say something out loud:

• "You just blew my mind."
• "Oh! Now I get it."
• "Whoa, no way!"

If you're giving a talk, someone's eyes will light up. Or nod vigorously. If you are in a webinar, they might write it in chat, maybe with a 🤯 emoji.

Whatever the signal, whenever that moment happens for that person, that's an event on the person's timeline.

Understanding this will help you optimize the performance of your value proposition. Since the metric is measured from the perspective of the learner, it'll be different for each person based on their previous experience, conceptual model, and ability to comprehend what you're saying.

But when you think of the learning experience as a journey, that happens over time, then obviously your goal is to reduce that TTMB as much as possible for everyone in the context you're delivering that experience in – workshop, talk, pitch deck, homepage. When that time is low more often than it's not, you know you've nailed down your value proposition.

It's their time to first bite, a mouthful of your umami-flavored value prop.

Have a lovely day,
Kamran