Power ‘Lines: Three Ways to Amplify Your Point

Looking to tone up your headlines for maximum impact? Exercise these principles to energize your reports, presentations and posts.

1. Say more with less: Pithiness rules in marketing. Limit each headline to around 60 characters and keep pruning your copy until it fits within the limit yet maintains clarity.

Example: Before: Steady growth was enabled by the brand’s ability to quickly take advantage of opportunity. After: The brand’s opportunity-seizing power fueled steady growth.

2. Strengthen your verbs: Adverbs enable weak verbs. To energize your headline and economize space, locate adverbs and obsolete them with stronger verbs.

Example: Before: She moves quickly. After: She jets.

3. Stay active: Active voice commands attention; passive voice lulls. In the active voice, the sentence’s subject comes before the action. To identify passive voice, scan for “to be” verbs and/or the word “by,” then restructure your sentence to eliminate them.

Example: Before: Active voice is wielded by strong writers. After: Strong writers wield active voice. 

Rob Cherry is EVP, Chief Creative Officer at Seed Strategy where he creates an atmosphere of trust, inspiration and enthusiasm to help Seed’s high-performing creative team do their best work on each and every project.

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