This is likely familiar if you’ve ever been in a pitch meeting or watched someone speak from a stage. They lean in, go fast… But nothing sticks. It sounds like something important was said, but it doesn’t leave an impression. Maybe the concepts is great; maybe communication itself is lacking in texture. That’s where a […]

This probably sounds familiar: It’s that moment in a lecture hall or boardroom when someone makes an assertive statement only to trail off with words such as maybe, perhaps, or it could be argued that. The crowd nods along but the energy seeps out of the room. On one hand, it sounded safe; on the […]

What happens when the action is supposed to be fast but the words are slow? You may have noticed your sentences drags. It’s often the result of too many adverbs. Adverbs are a writer’s quick fix: Use an adverb when you have a weak verb. It is like saying a door closes loudly, rather than […]

With this approach, Counter scans for starts to prepositional phrases, possible objects, stacked sentences, compound structures, and other elements of density. You get an idea of how much you’re packing into a piece of prose, and then you go back and edit out overwriting. Now, here’s the thing: Counter doesn’t merely count phrases. It classifies […]