Writing workshops, communication consulting and writing services
Screenwriter Nora Ephron long remembered the first day of her high school journalism class.
Ephron’s teacher announced the first assignment: to write the lead for a story to appear in the student newspaper.… Read the full article
Lede or lead?
You won’t find it in the Oxford English Dictionary. But the alternative spelling lede was supposedly created during the linotype era so as not to confuse lead with the strip of metal that was used to separate lines of type.… Read the full article
When I was editor of an executive magazine, I received dozens of press releases every day.
This was back in the day when releases moved on paper, so I read them over the trash can, giving myself just a few seconds from the time I picked the release up off the stack to the time it hit the circular file.… Read the full article
It’s counterintuitive, but true: The product is never the topic. The program is never the topic. The plan is never the topic.… Read the full article
Are you still using the fact pack — cramming who, what, when, where, why and how into the first paragraph of your news release?… Read the full article
Are you still using the fact pack — cramming who, what, when, where, why and how into the first paragraph of your news release?… Read the full article
When PR pros at the U.S. Green Building Council needed to round up resources in their Green Apple Day of Service, they didn’t write stories telling volunteers to get donations.… Read the full article
Some folks write “suitcase leads”: They try to cram all of the story elements into the top. Instead, make yours a bikini lead, and cover just the most interesting essentials.… Read the full article
Research shows … that nearly half of commuters text and drive … that one in three patients enters the hospital malnourished … and that 66% of women won’t kiss men with moustaches.… Read the full article
Here’s how Korbel Champagne Cellars topped a PRSA Silver Anvil Award-winning pitch:
