‘Short words are best, and old words when short are the best of all’
What do you notice about this passage, excerpted from an article in The Economist?… Read the full article
Tight writing
What is clarity in writing
Stop these institutional mistakes for readability
Want to make sure you’re not eradicating clarity in your organization?
Slaughter these problems instead, suggest Martin J. Eppler, Ph.D.,… Read the full article
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
Best practices for organizing magazine articles [Example!]
Romance meets finance in this feature
How do you organize a compelling feature?
Model this piece, which Loring Leifer wrote for Northern Funds’ marketing magazine, Northern Update.… Read the full article
‘Dear Mother’
Write a letter to make your copy conversational
“Good writers are visible just behind their words.”
— William Zinsser, author, On Writing Well
Eliot Fette Noyes was a Harvard-trained architect and industrial designer.… Read the full article
Quotes on conversational business writing
What writers and others say
“Good writing is good conversation, only more so.”
― Ernest Hemingway, American author and journalist famous for his economical, understated style
“Get human!
… Read the full articleThe (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
Say no more
Write a message statement in 23 words or less
My friends at TELLABS write brisk, interesting message statements — in 23 words or less.
Using message map guidelines from Tripp Frohlichstein, president of MediaMasters, they write one key message and three supporting points, like this:
“Tellabs innovates to help customers succeed — by cutting costs, generating revenue and improving the user experience.”… Read the full article