How to Write a Lead

A lead is the first sentence of a news article. An effective lead draws readers in and makes them want to read more.

Difficulty:

Moderately Challenging

Instructions

Things You'll Need

• Dictionaries
• Thesauri
• Writing Style Manuals
• Cassette Tape Recorders
• Spiral Notebooks
• Computers
• Word-processing Software

1. Think about how you would interest your best friend in this story if you were explaining it out loud. What's the "hook" that would grab his or her interest immediately?

2. Consider the most interesting part of the story. This needs to be used up front to interest the reader in what will follow, but still worded in a way that will get immediate attention.

3. Think of using an interesting fact, a question, or something humorous or provocative as your lead. Be sure you are completely familiar with your subject so that these "hooks" will more easily come to mind.

4. Use active verbs as much as you can, and avoid the passive voice. Use a thesaurus if you need active synonyms for passive words.

5. Read the lead objectively. Edit and rewrite to make it as lean as possible while still maintaining the factors that will draw in your reader.

Tips & Warnings

• Use the same tone in the lead that will follow through the entire story. Once you have grabbed the reader's attention, you don't want to change your style.

• Here's an example of an intriguing lead from the New York Times' Web site following a volatile week in the stock market in April 2000: "After Friday's wild sell-off, almost everybody on Wall Street thought that one of two things would happen Monday morning." The reader is left wondering what's to come; his or her curiosity has been piqued.

• In feature stories, there's more room to be creative with your lead. In straight news stories, however, you should usually try to include a good portion of the "five W's": who, what, where, when and why.

• Take care not to misspell anything in the lead. This is the editor's first impression of your writing.