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How to strengthen your writing: from ledes to nut grafs to self-edits
Journalists sometimes research for months and interview dozens of sources just to lose their audience in the first paragraph by failing to capture their attention. Mistakes like jargon, grammatical errors, and lack of clarity can sneak their way in, leading to unclear writing and confused readers.
This can be fixed by workshopping ledes and nut grafs with punchier language, engaging quotes, and cutting straight to the action.
The Institute's Beth Francesco and Elliot C. Williams shared several tips for strengthening writing at a workshop last month.
Here are the highlights:
How to catch the reader’s eye
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Use provocative ledes that center on an interesting fact or quote that will entice the reader to continue the story.
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Get straight to the point. The average attention span is eight seconds, and the average person can only comprehend three words during that time, so be short and direct.
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Ask yourself: "Do I have enough material to support this lede?" If not, do more reporting or rewrite the lede.
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Explain the story like you would to your mom by highlighting only the most key points of the story.
Streamline the nut graf
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Ask yourself: “Who is being affected?” and “Who am I writing for?” This is what your nut graf should answer.
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Provide the context, significance, and focus of the story.
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Find the essence of your story (and make it concise). Try to boil the story down into six words to be more succinct — even if you expand on this sentence as you write, this six-word line will help guide your story.
Do a final review
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Set aside 10 minutes after writing to focus and proofread.
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Try not to separate subjects and verbs with too many clauses because that can lead to confusing or inflated writing.
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Stay clear of preposition abuse: Using just a few helps establish the relationship between ideas, but too many lead to confusion and lack of clarity.
If you would like to purchase the recording of this session, email institute@press.org.
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