We all have had it drilled into our heads that we shouldn’t judge a book by its cover. But is that truly good advice?

When it comes to people, I couldn’t agree more. 

Please do not assume you know someone because they have certain tattoos or are wearing a Maga hat. People are the most important part of your everyday life, and they deserve the highest benefit of the doubt. 

But judging a book by its cover is a super helpful tool to sort through a world that demands our attention in a thousand ways every day. 

You don’t have time to get below the surface of every consideration in your day, so you have to use the cover sometimes to choose if you can dig into that Introduction, let alone Chapter One. So use discretion and filter the calls on your attention – don’t become a tyrant of judgment, but don’t feel guilty about discerning the value of something based on the surface-level facts. 

The “Book Cover” as a Tool

If you are in business, use the “cover” to your advantage. It would be best if you considered that everyone else is sub-consciously filtering calls on their attention too. 

How can you break through that noise to your target audience?  

You want to communicate who you are as quickly as possible, so your potential customers want to dive in deeper. Here are some possible ways to do this:

• A new website that grabs attention
• Window graphics that invite people in
• A memorable business card
• Giveaways or contests
• Curated social media 

So don’t judge a book by its cover if it’s a person, but do judge to reserve your most valuable resource: your attention. And consider how you can present the best “cover” for yourself or your business to your target audience.