Example write up8/1/2023 ![]() A creative lead is great - just don’t make your reader hunt for what the story’s about much after it.Ī note about the question lead. A variation of the creative lead, the question lead is just what it sounds like: leading with a question. If you go this route, make sure to provide broader detail and context in the few sentences following your lead. Better suited to feature stories and blog posts, these leads are designed to pique readers’ curiosity and draw them into the story. This can be an anecdote, an observation, a quirky fact, or a funny story, among other things. Claiming a celestial body guided them to the site, magi attending the birth say the boy will one day be king. In this type of lead, you want to determine which aspect of the story - who, what, when, where, why, and how - is most important to the reader and present those facts.Īn alleged virgin gave birth to a son in a barn just outside of Bethlehem last night. It sums up the situation succinctly, giving the reader the most important facts first. Most often found in straight news reports, this is the trusty inverted-pyramid lead we learned about in Journalism 101. There are two main types of leads and many, many variations thereof. All great content starts with a great lead. It promises the reader their time will be well-spent and sets the tone and direction of the piece. That “back” button is a thumb tap away.Ī good lead is enticing. ![]() If your content doesn’t hook readers up front, they’ll bolt. And, dare I say, a compelling lead is even more important in today’s rapid-fire digitalized world, where we have notoriously short attention spans and even less patience. Old-school reporting ace and author of ‘The Word: An Associated Press Guide to Good News Writing,’ Jack Cappon, rightly called lead-writing “the agony of square one.” A lot is hinging on your lead, because from it readers will decide to continue investing time and brain power in your content or jump ship. And now I’m on deadline, and here we are. This, in turn, prompted me to eat an entire bag of mini powdered donuts from the gas station, clean out my desk, poll my co-workers about their shower preferences (morning or night?) and watch several ‘America’s Got Talent’ clips. Then I got all stressed out about it - I mean, if any of my Dear Megan posts had BETTER have a really freakin’ good lead, it’s this one. ![]() The lead should capture the essence of the who, what, when, where, why and how - but without giving away the entire show.įunny thing about this blog post: When I sat down to write it, it dawned on me that I was trying to write a good lead for a post about how to write a good lead. What is a lead in writing? It’s the opening hook that pulls you in to read a story.
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