5 tips to help you write like a journalist

I fancied myself as a bit of a writer, back in the early 90s, thought I had a talent for it, until I started journalism training, then realised I didn’t. My ideas about great writing were turned on their head both during my training and as a cub reporter for the BBC.

Changing the way I wrote wasn’t easy. Rather than descriptive prose I was taught to get the point and to write in the vernacular – or the way we speak. This is way before social media, little was I to know how handy that skill would be later on. As a journalist to stay on the right side of your (often scary) Editor you must ensure your writing is engaging, factually correct and to the point. These are also all qualities of great blogs, marketing emails and social media copy.

So, I thought I’d share with you five easy-to-do things I learned as a journalist, to help you if you are looking to sharpen up your writing.

5 Tips to Get You Writing Like a Journalist

Write in short sentences

If you want your copy to be punchy then, most importantly, keep your sentences short. They will drive your reader to the point more quickly; which is ideal if you are trying to sell a product or deliver a message. Shorter sentences make writing easier to understand. This is a really handy writing technique for social media where sometimes you have a limited number of words to work with.

To keep your sentences short and sharp get rid of unnecessary words. One way to do this is to look back over your writing and see how many small words you can delete without changing the meaning of your sentence. A good word to start with is ‘that’; you’ll be surprised how many times you can delete ‘that’ without it making any difference to what you want to say.

Use present tense

Journalists write in the present tense because it’s the way to make you sound fresh and new. Equally, you don’t want your product or service to sound old. If you have to write about something that has already happened try exchanging the word ‘was’ for ‘has been’. Just sounds more current.

Long words don’t make you sound clever

In fact, sometimes they can alienate people, especially if they don’t understand what you have written. Also, your audience might feel you are talking down to them. It could distance you from the very people you are trying to make a connection with. Always aim to write things in the simplest terms possible. If you need inspiration dip into Harper Lee’s To Kill A Mockingbird, for simple writing as an art form.

Learn to write a headline

The opener, or top line as it’s known in the journalistic world, is crucial to grabbing attention and encouraging your audience to read on. There is a real skill in this because it can be hard to fit all the information to best describe what you are writing about into one sentence. Be prepared to sacrifice some detail in your top line and present only the most captivating bits.

Find your angle

A journalist is always looking for a hook; the strongest or newest angle to a story. Pretty easy to do when you are writing about something unique, that hasn’t happened before. But the same technique can be used to freshen up a long running story, to give it more mileage, by finding something about the story that hasn’t already been explored.

In a noisy marketplace you can still make your product or service stand out by looking for different aspects of the same story. It doesn’t matter if nothing new has happened as long as you can conjure up a new way to write it down. The key is not to repeat the same stuff, keep things fresh to keep people interested.

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