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Category: Barb Sawyers

Learn how to tell your story by watching television

By Barb Sawyers I've been writing stories for so long that it's becoming like driving a car. I don’t think about it.

Learn to write stories from television

No, I’m not a master storyteller grown rich on block-bluster movies and novels. I’m a practical writer who has spent years telling true tales of employees who rode to the rescue in natural disasters, impossible deadlines and other crises or how one business solved another’s problem. But ever since neuroscientists and marketing kings confirmed how stories open minds to new products and perspectives, everyone wants to know my secrets. Let me confess that I’ve learned more about storytelling from watching television than by reading great literature. That’s because television works with such simple and tested formulas. Here are the four main ingredients in the storytelling formula I learned from watching Law and Order and similar shows:

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New Year – a Prediction and Resolution Mashup

I asked some of our contributors if they wanted to share some predictions for 2011 and their New Year's Resolutions … Future-crystal-ball


From Mark Nicholson 

Social media – Quora will not live up to the early hype. 

Advertising – Facebook will introduce another advertising format option

Also – geo location advertising will make significant gains and mobile will continue to be faster growing area.


From Barb Sawyers

My predictions:

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Write like you talk–only better

Pen-to-paper I love to talk. I’ll bet you do too.

Like me, you’ve probably talked ever since you were about two years old.

I enjoy writing as well, but often it’s not as much fun. I have to think harder and remember lots of facts and rules. With many of my clients, I sometimes have to write corporate missives that sound like they’re on life support.

Worse still, writing can be lonely, just me and my computer.

That all started to change, though, when I wrote speeches for politicians.

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