Words That Work Book Summary

Book Summary

15 min

Audio available

Brief Summary

To reach general audiences, it’s important to understand the American public. People prefer simple language, short sentences, and credibility from the speaker. Make sure you’re maintaining authenticity by acting on the things you claim. It is also important to stay consistent and repeat your most important points with discipline. Try to offer something new despite the repetition by repackaging the message in novel ways. Pay attention to the sound and texture of your words. You want to build up a strong image in the mind of the listener and speak aspirationally: how do they imagine a good experience? Trigger emotions and understanding. Finally, make sure to give context so the listener can understand how your message is relevant.

About the Author

Frank Luntz is a political and communications consultant and pundit. He develops talking points for Republican causes. He frequently contributes to Fox News as a commentator and analyst and runs focus groups during and after presidential debates. He advocates for clearer word choice and has helped more than two dozen Fortune 500 companies grow.

Topics

Communication Skills

Words That Work Book Summary Preview

Who Should Read This?

Business people and politicians looking to promote their ideas
Those hoping to communicate clearly to general audiences
Writing, marketing and advertising professionals looking to strengthen their clarity

What You’ll Learn

How words dictate who gets elected President in the United States
Why certain brand slogans stick and others get forgotten
How to prevent being misheard and misunderstood

Key Insights

In this book, communications expert Frank Luntz advises readers on the best language to use when talking to an audience. He writes with business people and politicians in mind: professionals hoping to reach a large and general audience. He argues that by changing how we speak, we can better carry our ideas to more people and simple language is the key to getting our message across.

Understand that what you say and what people hear is different. Tailor your language to what your audience hears.

Have you ever been in a situation where you meant to say one thing but your conversation partner heard something completely different? Luntz explains that every single person has a slightly different understanding of words. In order to communicate effectively, we have to understand how people hear things.

For example, welfare and assisting the poor mean virtually the same thing, but Americans hear totally different phrases: 23% say the country needs more welfare while 68% say the country needs to help the poor. This is because people picture two separate things when hearing this difference in language. The first evokes images of laziness and welfare queens while the second conjures a picture of kindness and charity.

When we speak, we should consider our audience’s worldview and how words filter through them. One way to do this, Luntz writes, is to take a cue from George Orwell and allow the audience to leave room for the imagination. In 1984, he wrote of Room 101, a place where each person is confronted with their fears. By leaving it up to the reader to imagine their own personal fears, Room 101 was clearly communicated as a room of terror.

The best communicators use short words and brief sentences.

Think of the last time you picked up a dictionary to check the meaning of a word. Luntz writes that it is rare for people to look up words these days. So, communicating using words that the average person does not know will misfire.

If you speak to broad audiences, understand that most people have not graduated from college and spend most of their days at practical jobs. A majority of people do not have time to grow their vocabulary. To keep more people engaged, use the simplest language possible. Using obscure words will only make people resent you.

Luntz gives the example of Apple’s branding change. When they switched their product’s name from Macintosh to Mac, its popularity jumped.

Be mindful of your sentences too. Short sentences are as important as simple words. Luntz recommends reducing your message to the shortest phrase possible and using active verbs. For example, Dwight D. Eisenhower made his campaign slogan “I like Ike” after his nickname. The phrase...