How does  PR content need to come across? – concise, punchy, relevant and often short. We don’t always have the luxury of plenty of space to get our message across. So if we can cut out the extra verbage that sometimes litters our text, we can achieve all of this -- why use 25 words when 15 will do? If your heart sinks at the guidelines:  “optimum word length 400 to 600 words,”  don’t despair, you can still squeeze in all of your information. There are a couple of simple things you can do  to reduce the word length of your copy: 

1.  Keep an eye on those verbose and lengthy phrases. There’s no formula for simplifying phrases, but here are a couple of examples to consider:

• Long :  We distributed a survey that we hoped would give a strong  indication of user satisfaction levels.  (16 words)
• Improved:  A survey was conducted to measure user satisfaction levels. (9 words)
• Long:  There are a number of different approaches that can be used to reengineer the IT systems that organisations use to gather, store and disseminate information. (24 words)
• Improved: A number of approaches can be used to reengineer an organisation’s IT processes. (13 words)

  2.  Look out for commonly used phrases; many can be reduced to a single word:

• a large proportion of  -  many
• along the lines of  -  like
• are in a position to  -  can
• despite the fact that  -  although
• the greatest percentage of   -  most
• made a statement saying -  said
• during the time that  -  while
• for a period of  -   for
• for the most part  -  mainly
• has given  rise to  -  caused
• in some instances  -  sometimes
• it would appear that  -  apparently
• for the purposes of  -  for