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Day 10: The smartest thing Jeff Bezos ever did

Cohort Day

10

Hi there,

Are you familiar with Amazon’s “Write Like an Amazonian"?

Jeff Bezos famously banned PowerPoint at Amazon.

"It's probably the smartest thing we ever did."

They replaced it with 6-page memos. This built Amazon into a company with a strong writing culture.

Here's how to "Write Like an Amazonian." 

1. Use less than 30 words per sentence

Aim to be clear and concise.

The goal is to convey the main point. Quickly. 

Some ways to stay below 30: 

Avoid compound sentences. Break the sentence into two separate thoughts.

Use concise words. Here are some examples from Amazon’s “Write Like an Amazonian.”

Replace "with the exception of" with "except"

Replace "due to the fact that" with "because"

Replace "totally lacked the ability to" with "could not"

Replace "until such time as" with "until" Replace "for the purpose of" with "for"

And here are some additional examples:

Replace "in order to" with "to"

Replace "in the event that" with "if"

Replace "at this point in time" with "now"

Replace "despite the fact that" with "although"

Replace "subsequent to" with "after"

Replace "in the vicinity of" with "near"

Replace "in close proximity to" with "close to"

Replace "as a consequence of" with "due to"

Replace "for the duration of" with "during"

Replace "in the near future" with "soon"

Cut qualifiers like "I think" or "In my opinion." Be direct with your recommendation.

Use bullets and spacing to make your writing digestible. Tweeting is a great forcing function for concise writing.

2. Be objective: replace adjectives and adverbs with data

Numbers don't lie. Fluffy words are imprecise. Replace vague adjectives with data. 

"The social campaign will drastically improve echo dot sales." → "The social campaign will increase echo dot sales by 3.5%."

"Sending a follow up greatly increases sales." → "Follow ups increase sales conversions by 20%."

When writing posts for the cohort, you won't always have the time to conduct extensive research. 

However, the point of this tip is as follows: use fluffy adjectives and adverbs (extremely, very, exponentially) sparingly. 

Again, aim to be clear and concise. 

Go Deeper:

Check out “Copy of Writing Tips Email Sequence” for a copy of every email in this series

Check out Cohort Resources for all resources

Explore the Notion Home for cohort-specific information, like the Leaderboard

⚡

Day 10: The smartest thing Jeff Bezos ever did

Cohort Day

10

Hi there,

Are you familiar with Amazon’s “Write Like an Amazonian"?

Jeff Bezos famously banned PowerPoint at Amazon.

"It's probably the smartest thing we ever did."

They replaced it with 6-page memos. This built Amazon into a company with a strong writing culture.

Here's how to "Write Like an Amazonian." 

1. Use less than 30 words per sentence

Aim to be clear and concise.

The goal is to convey the main point. Quickly. 

Some ways to stay below 30: 

Avoid compound sentences. Break the sentence into two separate thoughts.

Use concise words. Here are some examples from Amazon’s “Write Like an Amazonian.”

Replace "with the exception of" with "except"

Replace "due to the fact that" with "because"

Replace "totally lacked the ability to" with "could not"

Replace "until such time as" with "until" Replace "for the purpose of" with "for"

And here are some additional examples:

Replace "in order to" with "to"

Replace "in the event that" with "if"

Replace "at this point in time" with "now"

Replace "despite the fact that" with "although"

Replace "subsequent to" with "after"

Replace "in the vicinity of" with "near"

Replace "in close proximity to" with "close to"

Replace "as a consequence of" with "due to"

Replace "for the duration of" with "during"

Replace "in the near future" with "soon"

Cut qualifiers like "I think" or "In my opinion." Be direct with your recommendation.

Use bullets and spacing to make your writing digestible. Tweeting is a great forcing function for concise writing.

2. Be objective: replace adjectives and adverbs with data

Numbers don't lie. Fluffy words are imprecise. Replace vague adjectives with data. 

"The social campaign will drastically improve echo dot sales." → "The social campaign will increase echo dot sales by 3.5%."

"Sending a follow up greatly increases sales." → "Follow ups increase sales conversions by 20%."

When writing posts for the cohort, you won't always have the time to conduct extensive research. 

However, the point of this tip is as follows: use fluffy adjectives and adverbs (extremely, very, exponentially) sparingly. 

Again, aim to be clear and concise. 

Go Deeper:

Check out “Copy of Writing Tips Email Sequence” for a copy of every email in this series

Check out Cohort Resources for all resources

Explore the Notion Home for cohort-specific information, like the Leaderboard