Say one thing. Say it in things you can touch. Leave one gap. End with a scene.
1. One core. If they can only keep one line, which line?
Pick it before you write the rest.
2. Concrete words. Swap each big word for a thing, a place, or a time.
3. One gap. Open a question your reader wants closed.
Answer it one beat later than they expect.
4. One scene. End on a moment they can picture, not a summary.
This pair is written for this page. It is not a panel run.
Every Friday at four, one of us reads the week's worst email out loud. Then we fix it together.
“Communicate better” became a time, a place, and an act.
There is now one line a listener can repeat on Monday.
These moves come from the SUCCESs checklist.
It is from Made to Stick, by Chip Heath and Dan Heath.
This site is independent. The authors did not endorse it.
Read the six checks on what makes an idea stick.
Why do people forget what I said?