Everybody Writes

ANN HANDLEY is a Wall Street Journal bestselling author focused on helping businesses worldwide escape marketing mediocrity to ignite tangible results. Her work has appeared in Entrepreneur, the Wall Street Journal, NPR, Chicago Public Radio, and the Financial Times. IBM named her one of seven people shaping modern marketing. More than 50K people subscribe to her popular email newsletter. She is the world’s first Chief Content Officer, a principal at training and education company MarketingProfs, and a regular speaker at events globally. Ann is also a mom, dog person, and writer. Her favorite food is kale salad. But don’t hold that against her.

Acknowledgments xvii

Start Here 1

Part I Writing Rules: How to Write Better (and How to Hate Writing Less) 15

1 Everybody Writes 19

2 Writing Is a Habit, Not an Art 21

3 How to Keep a Daily Writing Ritual When You Aren’t Feeling It 25

4 Shake Off School Rules 28

5 Publishing Is a Privilege 31

6 Why We Need a Writing Process 33

7 Introducing the Writing GPS Framework 35

8 Embrace the Ugly First Draft 44

9 Draft 2: Cross Out the Wrong Words 48

10 Draft 3: Swap Places with Your Reader 52

11 Draft 4: Humor Comes on the Rewrite 55

12 Develop Pathological Empathy 56

13 Think Before Ink 61

14 Fifteen Ways to Organize 65

15 Start with Dear Mom 68

16 If You Take a Running Start, Cover Your Tracks 70

17 Place the Most Important Words at the Beginning of Each Sentence 74

18 Notice Where Words Appear in Relation to Others Around Them 77

19 Leads and Kickers 79

20 Show, Don’t Tell 85

21 How to Write Funny 92

22 Use Surprising Analogies, Meaty Metaphors 97

23 Add Another Sense 103

24 Add Obvious Structure to a List 105

25 Approach Writing Like Teaching 108

26 Keep It Simple— But Not Simplistic 110

27 Find a Writing Partner 113

28 Avoid Hot Dog Writing 116

29 Hire a Human Editor 120

30 Set a Goal Based on Word Count (Not Time) 123

31 End on an I- Can’t- Wait- to- Get- Back- to- It Note 125

32 Deadlines Are the WD- 40 of Writing 126

Part II Writing Rules: Grammar and Usage 129

33 Use Real Words 131

34 Avoid Frankenwords and Words Pretending to Be Something They’re Not 133

35 Don’t Use Weblish (Words You Wouldn’t Whisper to Your Sweetheart in the Dark) 135

36 Default to the Present Tense 136

37 Choose Active Voice Over Passive Voice 139

38 Ditch Weakling Verbs 141

39 Adverbs Aren’t Necessary (Usually) 143

40 Use Clichés Only Once in a Blue Moon 146

41 “Mistakes Were Made.” Avoiding These Simple Mistakes Will Make You Look and Feel Smarter Instantly 149

42 Words We Always Get Wrong 154

43 Grammar Rules Made to Be Broken 164

44 Limit Moralizing 168

45 Eggcorns and Mondegreens 170

Part III Voice Rules 173

46 Sweat the Smallest Stuff 177

47 What’s Brand Voice? 180

48 How to Develop Your Brand Voice 182

49 Four Powerful Places to Apply Brand Voice 190

50 Voice Doesn’t Change, Tone Does 192

Part IV Story Rules 195

51 The Six Elements of a Marketing Story 197

52 Your Brand Story: Tell The Story Only You Can Tell 201

53 Product Story: Make Your Customer the Hero 206

54 The Rudolph Framework in Action 214

55 Hermit Crab Content 219

56 Innovation Is About Brains, Not Budget 221

Part V Publishing Rules 223

57 Share News That’s Really News 227

58 Biased and Balanced 229

59 Brands as Media Companies 231

60 Should You Ungate Your Content? 235

61 Memes, Trends, Newsjacking 239

62 Better Interviews with These Nonobvious Tips 247

63 Check Your Facts 252

64 A Mind- Like- Water Mindset 254

65 Seek Out the Best Sources 256

66 Beware of Hidden Agendas 257

67 Credible Data 258

68 Cite as You Write 260

69 Curate Ethically 265

70 Seek Permission, Not Forgiveness 270

71 The Basics of Copyright, Fair Use, and For Attribution 273

Part VI 20 Things Marketers Write 277

72 The New Ideal Length for Every Piece of Content 279

73 Writing Direct Response Email 282

74 Why You Need an Email Newsletter 289

75 Writing an Email Newsletter 292

76 Writing a Home Page 304

77 Writing the About Us Page 310

78 Writing Landing Pages 312

79 Writing Headlines 317

80 Writing Infographics 323

81 Writing for Video 327

82 Writing for Social Media 330

83 Writing Image Captions 338

84 Writing with Hashtags 343

85 Writing Your LinkedIn Profile 347

86 Writing for LinkedIn 351

87 Writing About Hard Stuff 357

88 Writing a Bolder Boilerplate 362

89 Writing Speech Descriptions 365

90 Writing a Sales Letter 369

91 Ghostwriting 373

Part VII Content Tools 377

Acknowledgments for Tools 393

Epilogue 395

Notes 397

Index 407