Audition your words to go in, not out
When Lynn Wylie, aka Best Sister Ever, sent me an Unfancy blog post arguing that all you need to look great every day is a capsule wardrobe of 37 items per season, I scoffed.… Read the full article
Story length
Story angle ideas: Summarize it on a billboard
6 words is the new black
Before you start writing, find your focus. Summarize your story angle in:
An elevator pitch
Say your biggest prospect joins you on the elevator in the lobby.… Read the full article
Measure estimated reading time to condense copy
How many minutes will it take them to read?
Writers measure copy in words, inches or pages. Readers use a different measure: time.
So instead of using writer-centric measures, think like your reader.… Read the full article
Short-form digital content helps readers choose
Too many options paralyze people
Here’s a famous story among persuasion researchers and Malcolm Gladwell fans:
When a researcher offered shoppers 24 types of jam, many customers stopped by for a sample, but only 3% made a purchase.… Read the full article
Short form vs long form for decision-making
People perform better when they’re not drowning in data
The more information you have, the better decisions you can make, right?
Wrong.
Yes, your digital marketing messages are more likely to climb higher in search results when the length of your content is 1,000 words or more.… Read the full article
Less is more
The longer your piece, the less readers will read
Size does matter.
The longer your story, the less of it your readers will read — and the less likely they are to understand and act on it.… Read the full article
How small is small?
Mini narratives can be as brief as a paragraph
In The Emperor of All Maladies, Siddhartha Mukherjee shares this tiny tale:
“In 2005, a man diagnosed with multiple myeloma asked me if he would be alive to watch his daughter graduate from high school in a few months.… Read the full article
The (One-Page) Magazine
The New York Times goes brief
Talk about brief: The New York Times packs 13 stories onto its briefs page, called The (One-Page) Magazine.
Notice the combination of:
- One-paragraph profiles, trend pieces and new nuggets
- One-sentence reviews
- Charts (History, in Kardashians)
- Glossary items (This should be a word: Denigreet)
- Timelines (This one’s running across the top and down the right side)
- Infographics (This one’s running across the bottom of the page)
How brief are your briefs?… Read the full article
6 words about writing
Readers offer super-short tips
Last month, in honor of Students First’s six-word essay contest to best describe what it means to be a great teacher, we asked readers to send us their writing tips in six words.… Read the full article
Write for the ear
Read your copy aloud
When Don Murray arrived in the newsroom for his first day on the job as writing coach for the Boston Globe, he turned to his new boss and said: “I can tell you who your three best writers are.”… Read the full article