After a few years of working closely with other reporters, I’ve found the points we most often talk about. Here’s a list.
- Tell me something that matters with your lede.
- Anecdotal ledes should follow through the narrative arc. That anecdote better be in your kicker too
- Either a story I want or a lesson I need. Readers want a great story or something that can help them (preferably both)
- Where is your nut graf? This always feels like what is most often missing. This is the pivot between a story and your point: what broader context brings this together?
- Structure and pace are two different skillsets
- Prepare headlines and stories for the wider social web. Help think through the tightest way to explain the importance of your story.
- Allow your story to be focused locally and understood globally
- That’s redundant, which means a waste of words, which is a sin.
- Know what your news site believes in. Who is your audience? What is the worldview? What is the broader narrative this story fits in?
- How could this story be told differently?
- What would the reader most need? What would help the reader scan? Would bullet points help?
- You haven’t earned long sentences; shorter sentences for pace
- Move faster; ship product
- Be flawless on grammar
- Hyperbole and cliche is where imprecision lives
- Human elements to give the reader a break from technical pieces
- Lead with attribution on purpose, either for style or more likely because the source matters. otherwise, lead with the lesson. the attribution is the footnote.
- Link for more information
- Have a call to action and make it easy
- When in doubt disclose. Transparency over all else
