Gotta get a message to you

There are about a quarter of a million words in the English language. Use them wisely.

Words matter. Even a single word can be important.

A kid I know got into Berkeley on a one-word answer to “Tell us about yourself”: Succinct.

True story.

The best messages are the simplest. 

Strong verb use, present tense and active voice. Three moves, starting today, that will strengthen everything you write — messages, articles, posts, client work.

Every word counts — especially in the age of 140-character communication.

The more words you throw at an idea the more bogged down it gets, the more bureaucratic. Successful communicators know it’s possible to be descriptive and still get to the point.

So, say it up front and make it interesting.

But how? Consider your audience and write to them. Imagine a single reader. What does she like? “How does he roll?”

Speak on the same level and in the same language as the audience. What are their hot buttons? What is the best way to transmit the message (text? Tweet?) so the message gets through?

What do you want them to do? Ask for it.

That ought to help, especially against the growing threat to the written word.

Grackle brain. Grackles are clumsy fliers and compulsive collectors of shiny junk — the original shiny-object-syndrome sufferers. Every one of us has Grackle Brain. In person, you have about seven seconds to make an impression. Online, closer to two.

And here’s what communicators underestimate: sending the message isn’t the same as the message arriving. Only 7 percent of comprehension comes from the words themselves. Thirty-eight percent comes from voice — tone, pitch, pace. Fifty-five percent comes from body language. Now we’re all on video calls, reduced to thumbnail rectangles, stripped of most of what makes a message register.

Writers are working against steep odds. The message has to fight through all of that.

Resist routine. The single most powerful countermove: resist the routine.

Work on strong first sentences — ones that could stop right there and still deliver. Cut to the heart of the matter. Resist the clichéd news lede. Under no circumstances write that lede.

On November 19, 1863, Lincoln delivered the Gettysburg Address. Its length: 272 words. Ten sentences. The crowd barely realized he’d begun before he finished and it remains one of the most powerful speeches in American history because of that brevity, not in spite of it.

What if Lincoln had opened with “Eighty-seven years ago” instead of “Four score and seven years ago”? Same moment but with completely different effect (Would we remember it?)

Let active verbs do the work. Write with nouns and active verbs, not adjectives and adverbs. Active verbs convey emotion and immediacy that no modifier can. Hear the difference between “Mistakes were made” and “I made a mistake.” Active voice is shorter, more precise and hits harder. Passive construction diffuses responsibility.

Use present tense as often as the content allows. The brain reads present tense as happening now — not the past, not a projection. Right now. That’s where you want your reader.

Kill the jargon. People are all wild to coin a new term and have a word of the week. Consequently, readers must sift through a migraine’s worth of buzzwords and “solution speak” to retain a college reading level.

Don’t do this and please fight the good fight with clients who want to include jargon, hype or cliché. You have an intelligent message to convey. Shrouding it in corporate psychobabble isn’t going to help.

Clear thought leads to clear writing. Clear writing begins with organization, moves through active voice and arrives at concise, vivid detail and a clean conclusion.

Tell stories. So, how do we connect, defy convention, cut through the psychobabble and nattering formulaic crap out there?

Most business communicators live in PowerPoint, and PowerPoint isn’t going anywhere. It has legitimate uses. But it relies on inductive logic — one point, then another point, then another, converging toward a “therefore.” That works for a legal brief. It doesn’t work for an audience you’re trying to move.

Story bypasses that approach. Story tells of darkening skies. Forces working against you. A storm gathering. Now your listener is the protagonist of a compelling narrative. What happens next? They lean forward.

Go to story, not to data. Story leads. Data is a backup singer.

People relate to plot, circumstance, transformation and growth. They don’t relate to metrics. Metrics can support the story but can’t replace it. Earn the data. Let the narrative carry it.

It comes down to this. Smart messages, transmitted in context, for distracted mobile audiences who have every reason not to pay attention.

Resist the routine. Write in active voice. Use the present tense. Kill the jargon. Tell stories. Make it about them.

There are about a quarter of a million words in the English language. Use them wisely.