That Hovering Question Mark

Every good story – and every good ad – begins with a statement that triggers more questions than it answers.

“I do not like to turn left when leaving my neighborhood…”

“I was a 10-year-old boy holding a flashlight for my father…”

“You are sitting in a candlelit restaurant when you hear a strange noise…”

The second line of your story is where the narrative arc begins. The narrative arc is the sequence of events, the plot. [In a radio ad, sfx means sound effect]

You are sitting in a candlelit restaurant when you hear a strange noise

[sfx-open] and the walls are instantly covered with jagged shards of golden light.

You hear another strange noise

[sfx-close] and the jagged shards of light are gone.

Murmurs of wonder flood the candlelit restaurant.

[sfx-open] The jagged shards appear on the walls again, dancing in unison to some silent music that only they can hear.

[sfx-close] And now they are gone.

The crowd applauds this unexpected delight. Smiles are beaming. Teeth are bright.

[sfx-open] More jagged shards. More golden light.

[sfx-close] No one notices the man at the table in the middle of the room, staring at his tablecloth, lost in thought. A woman emerges from the shadows behind him. Startled, he looks up, drops to one knee,

[sfx-open] and the golden shards of light dance fast and bright across his face and hers.

And then they kiss.

And the candlelit restaurant explodes in applause.

[sfx-close]  A tiny little box sits empty on the table.

Flickering Firelight diamonds, available exclusively at Morgan Jewelers.

Begin your ad with a statement that triggers more questions than it answers! If your opening line reveals what is to come, change the opening line.

“Guidomeyer’s Furniture is having a sale!”

When an ad begins with a sentence like that, you can be sure it was written by someone who follows the 5 W’s of journalism: Who, What, When, Where and Why.

Ads written by journalists are why most people hate advertising.

Guidomeyer’s Furniture is having a sale!

This week, Guidomeyer’s is having a sale

at 1715 Barkmaster Avenue! Save! Save!

Save up to 50% this week at Guidomeyer’s

annual clearance sale! Guidomeyer’s has been

serving the needs of Pottersville for 71 years,

so come to Guidomeyer’s and shop local

for all your furniture needs! We have recliners,

coffee tables, end tables, nightstands, TV trays

and financing will be available! Guidomeyer’s

Annual Clearance Sale! This week! 1715 Barkmaster!

Hurry, hurry, hurry before all the good stuff is gone!

Guidomeyer’s!

1. Guidomeyer is who.
2. A Sale is what.
3. This Week is when.
4. 1715 Barkmaster is where.
5. Annual Clearance is why.

That formula is so simple an idiot could use it. And idiots often do.

No, I don’t mean that. Words have meanings, so let me be accurate. I don’t think such a person is an ‘idiot.’ ‘Moron’ would be the accurate term. Technically, a moron is an adult with the mental age of 7-10. Morons are more intelligent than idiots and imbeciles, but they are an especially troublesome group because they are not aware of their shortcomings.

Don’t be a moron.

Getting the listener’s attention is easy, but holding that attention requires skill.

1. Open with a statement that triggers more questions than it answers.
2. Bridge quickly into the narrative arc, the plot.
3. When your listener thinks they know where you are headed, take them somewhere else.
4. Introduce divergent elements that don’t belong together,
5. then make them converge, add up, and make sense.
6. Lead your listener to the conclusion, then allow them to discover it on their own. Don’t tell them the answer. Let them hear it in their mind.
7. Leave out the irrelevant, the predictable, and anything that makes your ad sound like an ad.

Poetic meter makes words musical.

To achieve it, arrange the drumbeats of the stressed and unstressed syllables of your words so that they create a percussive rhythm in the mind. There are a couple of dozen rhythms that are easily achievable in English.

The simplest of those – anapestic meter – is two light stresses followed by a heavy third stress.

pum-pum-PUM-pum-pum-PUM- pum-pum-PUM-pum-pum-PUM

And his cohorts were gleaming in purple and gold;

And the sheen of their spears was like stars on the sea,

Like the leaves of the forest when Summer is green,

Like the leaves of the forest when Autumn has blown,

For the Angel of Death spread his wings on the blast,

And the eyes of the sleepers waxed deadly and chill,

And there lay the steed with his nostril all wide,

And the foam of his gasping lay white on the turf,

And so there lay the rider distorted and grey,

And the widows of Ashur are loud in their wail,

So I walk by the edge of a lake in my dream.

It is easy to become a musical writer. All you have to do is spend time reading the words of the great ones.

Don’t read ads. Read the poems, short stories and novels written by the winners of the Pulitzer and Nobel prizes in Literature.

“In the late summer of that year we lived in a house in a village that looked across the river and the plain to the mountains. In the bed of the river there were pebbles and boulders, dry and white in the sun, and the water was clear and swiftly moving and blue in the channels. Troops went by the house and down the road and the dust they raised powdered the leaves of the trees. The trunks of the trees too were dusty and the leaves fell early that year and we saw the troops marching along the road and the dust rising and leaves, stirred by the breeze, falling and the soldiers marching and afterward the road bare and white except for the leaves.”

– Ernest Hemingway, the opening lines of A Farewell to Arms

“I read that paragraph and I want to cry. It’s incredibly beautiful. He broke every rule. All the repetition! In four sentences the word ‘and’ appears 15 times. What’s going on is just an unforgettable display of rhythmic mastery. There’s a kind of, almost a kind of hypnosis, an incantation that is about the frame of mind you’re going into the war with.”

– Stephen Cushman, Literary Scholar

“Listening to Bach – and recognizing the repetition of particular notes in Bach – inspired Hemingway to write A Farewell to Arms.” 

– Miriam Mandel, Literary Scholar

Take another look at Hemingway’s opening sentence and notice the questions it raises: “In the late summer of that year (What year?) we lived in a house in a village that looked across the river and the plain to the mountains. (Where are we?)”

You can do this. None of it is beyond you. Morons will tell you that you’re doing it wrong, but your ads will take your listeners on a marvelous journey, and your clients to heights that no other ad writer can take them.

Do you want to be a journalist, or do you want to be an ad writer?

Roy H. Williams

Many business owners and company employees find their younger colleagues irritating. Guess what? The feeling is mutual, as Millennials and Gen-Z often lack respect for their older co-workers. Chris DeSantis has studied generational differences for 18 years and believes the generational friction that is so prevalent these days can be leveraged to the benefit of the organization and all its people. Listen and learn as Chris DeSantis tells roving reporter Rotbart how most companies get it wrong. How does Rotbart find such fascinating guests! MondayMorningRadio.com