8 jouro techniques_4_communicators_withnotes_nx

Editor's Notes

• #2: Storytelling, brand journalism, and content strategy are the current industry trends captivating traditional communications and marketing. At a recent“Ask the Expert” session held at Simplicity Consulting, Inc. in Kirkland, we discussed eight techniques, borrowed from journalism, that every communicator can use to instantly refresh their content.Know your audienceWrite headlines not subjectsDelivering the real who, what, when, where, why and howStop burying the leadFind the storyWrite to the funnelEffective hooks and blurbsChoosing photosI choose these eight journalism tips, because I thought communicators could most consistently apply them to get immediate impact. This deck was targeted toward written journalism, but all the techniques would also work for broadcast journalism/videos.Feel free to ping me if you have any questions.
• #3: It used to be marketing was on one side of the writing spectrum and journalism was on the other. Now we’ve got a lot of new areas in between:from brand journalism/content strategy (more on the journalism side) and content marketing (more on the marketing side). But the key lesson from classic journalism – tell a story, briefly that communicates something to the reader – sounds like what we do in marketing now!
• #5: Demographics – Who are they?Usually top-of-mind when thinking about knowing your audienceAre they sales, engineers, global, local, customers, partners, old, young, in-between? What do you know about them that’s visible or invisible? How might that impact how you write for them? Non-native English speakers (be careful with readability, colloquialisms, contractions, humor)Customers – don’t use internal acronymsGroups with specific traits – e.g. are they more literal, familiar with metaphors and vision-speak? If not, don’t use.Purpose - Why are they reading?Have to know why they are reading/consuming your/this piece of information.Demographics for publications like the Wall Street Journal and Vanity Fair might be similar, but people are reading them for different purposesThis can impact cadence, word choice, use of humor, illustrationsAttention Span - How long do you have their attention?This is especially important now that there are so many ways to consume informationWhat’s the most likely way they will consume this information? On the phone? Between meetings? Are they going to focus and read it (unlikely!)?This can impact length of stories, type size, cadence and formality of writing, types of images
• #7: It’s not just about the story (standard who, what, where, when, why & how)It’s about the reader -- Make it relevant!Get in the reader’s shoes – not just about the story, about their role in the storyTacticsUse a chart similar to this slide, and answer the questions for your contentMake a mindmap with the reader in the middle and who, what, where, when, why & how as the first set of bubbles
• #9: One of the most common issues I see in corporate communicationsThe lead (like leader, not pencil lead) of the story is the key point of the storyBurying the lead is putting that key point somewhere toward the middle or end of the storyThe key is knowing what the lead really is – which means the piece of information most important to your audience! Is there something they need to act on?That’s critical for them to know – put it first (or at least in the first paragraph)Sometimes communicators “bury the lead” on purposeIf they are trying to sugar-coat bad news, criticism or an unwelcome messagePosition the information well, but it does a disservice to your reader to hide bad news The verbal method of “sandwiching” criticism or bad news (compliment/criticism/compliment or good news/bad news/good news) doesn’t work in print – because you can’t know if someone will read beyond the opening point Sometimes they keep the most important piece of information to the end, using it as a “tease” to keep people reading (like putting the categories people care most about at the end of the Academy Awards ceremony).Unless people are extremely compelled to keep reading (they may have won, they REALLY care about it), likely they’ll stop reading before they get to the key pointTeasing only works so many times before it becomes old – if you do it a lot people will start skipping to the end if they want to know, then the rest of the great story you’ve written is wasted. But most often, the lead gets buried because communicators are looking at the key point from their point of view, instead of their audience’sClassic journalism exercise: you’re tasked to write a story previewing the budget and new programs being discussed at a district planning meeting for teachers. The story will be included in the elementary school newsletter that’s sent home with students every MondayThe planning meeting is 8am – 5pm on Thursday at the state education offices Critical topics being covered at the meeting:The annual budgetSchool performanceThe new parent integration programMandatory teacher trainingWhat’s the lead? Often people will choose something related to the story they are tasked with – previewing the budgetBut the lead of the story is actually – “School’s out next Thursday” because that’s what’s most important to the audience of the newsletter (parents and children)
• #11: Why are headlines important?8-10 people will read headline copyonly 2 of 10 will read the rest of the storyWhat does/can a headline do:Attract – get the reader’s attentionuse vibrant wording (e.g. fear, war, brilliant, fails, horrifying, ultimate)don’t be afraid to be negative to get attention (within reason, based on your audience & publication)E.g. “The 5 worst things you could do”, “the biggest fears…”, “the most hated words…”Engage – interact with the reader, make them curiousDon’t be pushy (you, you’re, must, should)Use enough words to get the point across, but not too longInform –What’s the benefit to the reader? If this is all they read, can the title tell them something useful?Headline tactics:Write in present tense (e.g. “Obama hosts the winning team” – even if it happened yesterday )Be careful about wordplay or humor (sometimes clever is good, sometimes it’s cringe worthy). Be especially careful if you have a heavily non-native English speaking audienceExamples on the slide: “New Jersey Pulls the Plug on Tesla” – funnier if you know Tesla is an electric car, but still makes sense if you don’t“Herbalife wilts on news of FTC investigation” (Herbs wilt – funny, maybe?)Challenge yourself to keep headlines under 75 characters (most of the titles in the slide are less than that)Both Outlook and Word have a word count tool – look for it toward the left of the Review toolbarKeep an idea file/tracking fileKeep a file of headlines you likeFigure out what makes them work for you to make a templateUse them with editing wording when you’re not feeling creativeMeasure what headlines work well with your audiencee.g. Outbrain found articles with worst or other negative superlatives got 65% more click-throughs then those with positive headlines for their readership, this doesn’t hold true on all sites though
• #13: Find the story and tell it!A story is something with a beginning, middle and end – it doesn’t always have to have a narrativeThink about pitching this to your reader – is it exciting and relatable or dull, dull, dull?Is there something people can visualize in their mind? Or put themselves in the scenario?“When you’re in the cafeteria next time, look for…” – people can imagine themselves in the cafeteria“Grab a cup of coffee, take a deep breath, and begin…”“Remember the last time you…”Find the human element. People like to read about people.They need to care – either be invested themselves or invested in somebody else.That’s one reason charity ads tell the story of one puppy or one boy or girlInspire curiosity – get people to wonder “what happens next..” (more on that in hooks)Engage people’s emotions and senses within bounds – you need to respect your audience and make it appropriate for them, but even in business environments people get more engaged when they feelUse words that evoke emotionsdisturbingtriumphantgleefulBuild tension in a story – “something bad is happening, whatever will we do?” - that then gets solved with something good – or a more positive world view.
• #14: Be brief!!Reading
• #15: Write most relevant to least relevantThis is from the old world of newspapers that were hand pasted – if your story went too long, or if the space it had to fit in became smaller (a hot new story came in), the editor would just cut off paragraphs from the end of your storyIt still works well today -- if your reader stops reading, they’ll still have the critical infoIt also makes it easier to edit if your newsletter or email gets too long – just cut off the end like in the old daysA corollary to this is -- Be brief!! Nowadays even feature articles are getting shorter -- people have short attention spans, and small blasts of timeKnow your audience – do they want deep information, or are they browsing?If they want deep information, you may be able to go longer, and spread information out fartherBut if readers are just browsing and likely to stop reading early, put the important info up-frontAlso -- the less they care, generally the less they’ll readTactics:Use a mind maponce you have the key content areas on the map give each a priority numbermake sure the higher priority numbers go earlier in your article – and if you mark it lower than pri 3 – consider just leaving it outTo paraphrase a quote – be as simple as you can be, but no moreThis is really a fiction technique, but it works well here -- Kill your darlings Cross out every word/line that’s not advancing the story or communicating critical informationOnly add back in the words or lines that are critical to give the story flowKeep in mind – it takes more time to write a crisp, concise story than a long one - “I would have written a shorter letter, but I did not have the time.” ―Blaise Pascal (also attributed to Ben Franklin and others)
• #18: What’s a blurbA short summary of a story Why might you blurbShare quick bytes of informationWall Street Journal Blurbs (photo on left of slide) – most less than 20 words. If you scan these, you get the gist of the story, and they always have the page with the full story at the end. Often newsletters will do this with a [more] link at the endGive people a “tease” of information to make them curious enough to read the whole articleTeaser blurbs are dangerous – use them sparingly “click here to find out more” “and the winner is” They work well on tv (stay tuned to find out…), but not so well in print—unless people really, really care, a teaser blurbjust means they won’t click AND they didn’t learn anythingWhat’s a hook?a story technique to “hook” the reader’s attention so they keep readingHeadline Hook -- headlines that attract and engage the reader’s attentionParagraph ending hook – Similar to chapter hooks used a lot in books to keep readers from stopping reading at the end of a chapter -- “oh no, the hero is in peril” or sets up a fascinating question – answered by research in the next chapterCan also be used at the end of paragraphs in an article Set up some tension – relieve it in the beginning of the next paragraph Recent example: in this fast pace world, there’s just no keeping up with the interruptions and the constant pressure to multitask (OH NO – what will I do?)[next paragraph] But we have some great researched-based tips…
• #20: Lots of reasons to use images, other than the pure visual appealThe two main reasons for journalism: Drive interest or attract attention: Images to drive interest (slide:Chobani – if I like Chobani, I’ll probably at least glance at the story)Tell the story, or make them curious. (slide: skeleton with phone, woman kissing frog)Can just be purely eye-catching. Think magazine covers – Rolling Stone covers, book covers. People love pictures of people! Especially if they might see themselves, or someone they know.Images are used more and more in journalism, even in serious publications. TheWall Street Journal used to be really text-dense, now more images – especially for clarity (all newspaper photos on the slide are from the Wall Street Journal). Drive understanding or retention: A picture, chart or map is worth a thousand words This can really help with being brief – a chart or image can save lots of wordsMany people are visual learners – so presenting the information in a visual as well as written format can help comprehensionTypes of images:Tables, charts, maps, quick summaries (slide:broadband competition map, table with product comparisons)Photo references, screen shots (slide:photo of elevator lobby door)Cut-outs, takeaways (slide: no, not now, never summary story summary) – can get reader’s attention, tells the story in brief, readers could clip/photo it for reference/reminderInfographics – not just for USA Today anymore
• #21: Tools and ResourcesImages:Use the Windows snipping tool – a small image of the form or toolbar or webpage can save readers a lot of timeUse your camera! Sometimes it’s easier to just take your own photo, than try to find an appropriate image or worry about image licensingMake sure your photo quality matches your publication formalityformal publication – make it professional lookinginformal publication – “disposable” or timely content – it’s ok to be more informal (e.g. the newspaper photos in this deck)Get images from the web via Bing or Google – just make sure they’re licensed to use where you want – creative commons, or often if the image creator isn’t a professional you can just email them and get permissionStock photo sites – istockphoto.com is a great site with (mostly) reasonable prices and generous licensing terms, there are quite a few others tooWriting Style ManualsThese manuals outline grammar rules, capitalization, punctuation…The two most common ones are the AP Stylebook and the Chicago Manual of Style At Microsoft, unless there is a product/group specific style manual, the Chicago Manual of Style is the default (if you’re a vendor working on a Microsoft project, you can access it by going to the MS Library site and searching on “Chicago Manual of Style” otherwise, it’s on the web (subscription needed) at www.chicagomanualofstyle.com The AP Stylebook is at www.apstylebook.com – you can buy a hard copy or get an online subscription for $26/year. Both are available at any bookseller or libraryMicrosoft Office ToolsWord Count – available in Word & Outlook (Review toolbar, toward the left side)Thesaurus – available in all the Office 2013 apps (Review toolbar, toward the left, or Alt-F7)If you use these tools a lot – it’s helpful to either memorize the keyboard shortcut (Thesaurus = Alt-F7) or add them to your Quick Access Toolbar (QAT)The QAT is that little toolbar that sits above or below the big toolbars – it usually has “save” “undo” “redo” and those type of commandsTo add items to that toolbar the easy way, just right-click on the toolbar button you want to add (Word Count), and choose “Add to Quick Access Toolbar”You can customize the order of the toolbar, or add more menus by clicking on the little downward facing triangle with the line above it at the end of the QATReadability – both Outlook & Word have this functionality – see below on how to set it up and how to use it. This can be really handy if you’re writing information for a global audience with large numbers of non-native English speakers. Try to keep the readability scores fairly low, to increase the probability that everyone in your audience will understand what you’ve written. Test your document's readabilityWhen Microsoft Outlook and Microsoft Word finish checking the spelling and grammar, you can choose to display information about the reading level of the document, including readability scores according to Flesch Reading Ease and Flesch-Kincaid Grade LevelEnable readability statisticsOutlookClick File, and then click Options.Click Mail, and then, under Compose Messages, click Spelling and AutoCorrect.Click Proofing.Under When correcting spelling in Outlook, make sure the Check grammar with spelling check box is selected.Select the Show readability statistics check box.After you enable this feature, open a file that you want to check, and check the spelling. When Outlook or Word finishes checking the spelling and grammar, it displays information about the reading level of the document.WordClick the File tab, and then click Options.Click Proofing.Under When correcting spelling and grammar in Word, make sure the Check grammar with spelling check box is selected.Select Show readability statistics.After you enable this feature, open a file that you want to check, and check the spelling. When Outlook or Word finishes checking the spelling and grammar, it displays information about the reading level of the document.Understand readability scoresEach readability test bases its rating on the average number of syllables per word and words per sentence. The following sections explain how each test scores your file's readability.Flesch Reading Ease testThis test rates text on a 100-point scale. The higher the score, the easier it is to understand the document. For most standard files, you want the score to be between 60 and 70.The formula for the Flesch Reading Ease score is:206.835 – (1.015 x ASL) – (84.6 x ASW)where:ASL = average sentence length (the number of words divided by the number of sentences)ASW = average number of syllables per word (the number of syllables divided by the number of words)Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level testThis test rates text on a U.S. school grade level. For example, a score of 8.0 means that an eighth grader can understand the document. For most documents, aim for a score of approximately 7.0 to 8.0.The formula for the Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level score is:(.39 x ASL) + (11.8 x ASW) – 15.59where:ASL = average sentence length (the number of words divided by the number of sentences)ASW = average number of syllables per word (the number of syllables divided by the number of words)