What do you think?
Rate this book
Tactical Writing Guide: Tactics for Tight Writing
HOW TIGHT IS YOUR WRITING?
Tight writing delivers lean, high-energy content to your readers. It empowers them with information that’s easy to find, understand—and use. That turns them into clients, subscribers, or better-informed citizens. The Tactical Writing Guide shows you how to write tight text every time.
The guide presents dozens of tactics for creating concise, compelling content. It shows you how to:
- Make your words punch
- Hack the fat out of your text
- Organize your content for maximum impact
- Gather intel on your audience
This is just some of what you’ll learn:
CHOOSE POWERFUL WORDS.
Paint pictures in your readers’ minds using specific, vivid nouns. Don’t say “dog” if you mean “chihuahua.” Unleash that yapping pet in your readers’ imaginations.
Entertain readers with action-packed verbs. Don’t say “The assailant struck the victim” if you mean “The attacker punched the victim in the mouth.” Now we have a robust verb (“punched”) and precise nouns (“attacker” and “mouth”). They plant a high-intensity vision in the readers’ minds.
Find alternatives to boring, overused verbs like “to be,” “to do,” “to have,” and “to go.”
CUT WORD CLUTTER.
Word clutter suffocates your message and your readers’ interest. This fatty text includes unneeded words and long-winded phrases. It wastes readers’ time and makes them work harder to understand your message.
Eliminate:
- Excessive prepositional phrases
- Long phrases that replace single words
- Unneeded topics
Shorten everything: words, phrases, sentences, and paragraphs.
Use personal pronouns whenever possible because they:
- Add a conversational tone
- Help keep the writing in the active voice
- Shorten the writing
Shorten your text with contractions to keep the tone conversational.
MAKE YOUR INFORMATION EASY TO FIND.
Present key information first.
Structure your content with headings, subheadings, and labels.
Explode dense paragraphs using:
- Bullets
- Numbered lists
- Chronological lists
- Tables
GATHER AUDIENCE INTEL.
Identify your audience. The “general public” is too vague to be useful. Be specific, like this:
- Travel enthusiasts
- Environmental activists
- Parents of disabled children
- Business owners
- Mobile device consumers
- Cancer patients
Next, explore their needs. What information do they seek from you? What do they already know? What do you want them to know? When you write, you must take the lead and ensure the audience receives the most important information.
WE'RE JUST GETTING STARTED.
This book offers more than 50 powerful tactics to help you tighten your writing. Grab a copy and master them all. Your readers will thank you.
Tight writing delivers lean, high-energy content to your readers. It empowers them with information that’s easy to find, understand—and use. That turns them into clients, subscribers, or better-informed citizens. The Tactical Writing Guide shows you how to write tight text every time.
The guide presents dozens of tactics for creating concise, compelling content. It shows you how to:
- Make your words punch
- Hack the fat out of your text
- Organize your content for maximum impact
- Gather intel on your audience
This is just some of what you’ll learn:
CHOOSE POWERFUL WORDS.
Paint pictures in your readers’ minds using specific, vivid nouns. Don’t say “dog” if you mean “chihuahua.” Unleash that yapping pet in your readers’ imaginations.
Entertain readers with action-packed verbs. Don’t say “The assailant struck the victim” if you mean “The attacker punched the victim in the mouth.” Now we have a robust verb (“punched”) and precise nouns (“attacker” and “mouth”). They plant a high-intensity vision in the readers’ minds.
Find alternatives to boring, overused verbs like “to be,” “to do,” “to have,” and “to go.”
CUT WORD CLUTTER.
Word clutter suffocates your message and your readers’ interest. This fatty text includes unneeded words and long-winded phrases. It wastes readers’ time and makes them work harder to understand your message.
Eliminate:
- Excessive prepositional phrases
- Long phrases that replace single words
- Unneeded topics
Shorten everything: words, phrases, sentences, and paragraphs.
Use personal pronouns whenever possible because they:
- Add a conversational tone
- Help keep the writing in the active voice
- Shorten the writing
Shorten your text with contractions to keep the tone conversational.
MAKE YOUR INFORMATION EASY TO FIND.
Present key information first.
Structure your content with headings, subheadings, and labels.
Explode dense paragraphs using:
- Bullets
- Numbered lists
- Chronological lists
- Tables
GATHER AUDIENCE INTEL.
Identify your audience. The “general public” is too vague to be useful. Be specific, like this:
- Travel enthusiasts
- Environmental activists
- Parents of disabled children
- Business owners
- Mobile device consumers
- Cancer patients
Next, explore their needs. What information do they seek from you? What do they already know? What do you want them to know? When you write, you must take the lead and ensure the audience receives the most important information.
WE'RE JUST GETTING STARTED.
This book offers more than 50 powerful tactics to help you tighten your writing. Grab a copy and master them all. Your readers will thank you.
- GenresWriting
126 pages, Kindle Edition
Published March 31, 2019
9 people are currently reading
308 people want to read
About the author
Greg Rosenthal
1 book5 followersGreg Rosenthal has been battling gobbledygook for more than 20 years as a government communications professional and freelance writer/editor. Every workday, he uses the tactics in the Tactical Writing Guide to craft concise and compelling articles, speeches, web content, outreach publications, and blog posts. He loves to share these techniques with others. In fact, the Baltimore Sun featured him in a 2013 article on plain language in government.
Rosenthal also runs a freelance writing and editing service called The Plain Language Factory, LLC, and produces writing videos for his Tactical Writing Academy YouTube channel. In his free time, he hikes, travels, reads, and plays board games with family and friends.
He earned a B.A. in hearing and speech sciences from the University of Maryland at College Park, and a B.A. in communication studies from the University of Maryland University College. Rosenthal is also a Gulf War veteran, who served as an airlift flight engineer in the U.S. Air Force Reserve.
Rosenthal also runs a freelance writing and editing service called The Plain Language Factory, LLC, and produces writing videos for his Tactical Writing Academy YouTube channel. In his free time, he hikes, travels, reads, and plays board games with family and friends.
He earned a B.A. in hearing and speech sciences from the University of Maryland at College Park, and a B.A. in communication studies from the University of Maryland University College. Rosenthal is also a Gulf War veteran, who served as an airlift flight engineer in the U.S. Air Force Reserve.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
October 7, 2019
Short but spot on!
If one follows the writing guidelines in this book (very short , more a booklet) a superior product is almost guaranteed.
As I mention in nearly all my reviews, the criteria U use to judge the quality of the product are three: coherence, relevance, and organization.
I will be recommending this book to many wannabe writers I know, as the most frequently encountered problems they experience are addressed here.
This book follows its own advice, and I know my writing will be more invigorated immediately.
The author writes in a simple and accessible manner, and does not make one feel talked down to.
My Funk and Wagnalls remains the " bible" of writing, but this is a great decoder of the often difficult to retain material. Perhaps it is because of the copious illustrative examples.
If one follows the writing guidelines in this book (very short , more a booklet) a superior product is almost guaranteed.
As I mention in nearly all my reviews, the criteria U use to judge the quality of the product are three: coherence, relevance, and organization.
I will be recommending this book to many wannabe writers I know, as the most frequently encountered problems they experience are addressed here.
This book follows its own advice, and I know my writing will be more invigorated immediately.
The author writes in a simple and accessible manner, and does not make one feel talked down to.
My Funk and Wagnalls remains the " bible" of writing, but this is a great decoder of the often difficult to retain material. Perhaps it is because of the copious illustrative examples.
February 17, 2020
Very clear an concise instructions on how to improve your writing and pitfalls to avoid. The examples were very useful and explained how to sharpen the message you are trying to convey. I plan on using this as a reference and refer to it again as I improve my writing skills.
I received this book free as part of the Goodreads first reads.
I received this book free as part of the Goodreads first reads.
October 2, 2019
Just Kind Of Meh
While it's perfect for the beginning writer, for me it's nothing that I haven't read in other books. It's length is perfect if you're just looking for the basics.
While it's perfect for the beginning writer, for me it's nothing that I haven't read in other books. It's length is perfect if you're just looking for the basics.
February 2, 2020
Excellent guide: how to write (or edit) succinctly. This GoodreadsGiveaway review copy will remain on my Kindle reference shelf. Well worth reading.
Want to read
November 11, 2019Thank you for the opportunity to review this book as a giveaway recipient. I am excited to read it and will update my thoughts on this book soon!
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews