Shape
- Typical length: short, about 40 to 125 words per post.
- Typical sentence length: mostly 5 to 15 words. The longest is 19: "We record one long video at the start of each month, and everything else comes out of that recording:" Some lines are fragments: "Fewer posts, more replies."
- Typical paragraph length: one to three sentences, often a single sentence on its own line.
- How a piece usually opens: one short line that stands alone. It is the situation ("For a year we posted every single day."), the point ("Posting every day made our content worse, not better.") or a setup line ending in a colon ("The one recording habit that made our videos easy to cut up:"). No greeting, and no question as the opener.
- How a piece usually ends: on what you do now and what it changed, for example "We post less now, and we hear back more." and "We now check every answer for that one sentence before we hit record." The longest post then adds one question to the reader.
- Lists or no lists, and how they are marked: one list across the three posts, in the longest one. A colon introduces it, and each item starts with an arrow, lowercase, no full stop: "→ the short clips", "→ the carousel".
Words
- Words and phrases they use often: "one" (eight times, including "one thing", "one afternoon", "one sentence", "one video a month"). "the point". "now" for the after part ("Now we record", "We now check"). Plain words that move the story along: "For a year", "By the end", "So we changed one thing". You also reuse your own lines word for word across posts: "to fill a slot, not because we had something to say", "worse, not better", "a post on its own".
- Words they never use, judging by the samples: marketing terms. Where others would write "repurpose", you write "cut up" and "everything else comes out of that recording". Where others would write "engagement", you write "replies" and "hear back".
- First person: "we" only ("we posted", "our videos"). "I" is not in the samples.
- How they address the reader: mostly you tell your own story with "we". You switch to "you" for the rule ("Say the point in one sentence before you explain it.") and for the closing question.
- Contractions: none. You write "If you cannot" and "is not ready", not "can't" or "isn't".
Punctuation and format
- Exclamation marks: none.
- Questions: one in three posts, as the last line, offering two answers: "How do you plan your content: day by day, or in batches?"
- Emojis: none. No hashtags either.
- Dashes, brackets, colons: no dashes, no brackets. Colons are a favourite: before a list, before a rule ("The rule that makes it work: say the point..."), at the end of an opening line, and inside a question. Lowercase after a colon in the middle of a sentence.
- Capitals for emphasis: none.
- Numbers: written as words, no digits or percentages: "a year", "one afternoon", "one video a month".
Tone
- Three words for the tone: plain, candid, practical. You admit what went wrong ("nobody on the team wanted to open the content calendar") and finish with something the reader can use.
- How they make a point: problem, one change, result. Usually point first (posts 2 and 3), sometimes story first (post 1). Contrasts come in pairs: "worse, not better", "Fewer posts, more replies", "If you can do that... If you cannot...". The proof is your own experience, not numbers.
- How direct they are when asking for something: gentle. The only ask is one open question at the end. No "comment below", no "follow", no links. How you ask for a sale or a sign-up: not in the samples.
Never do
Three short posts is a small base, so treat these as strong patterns rather than proven rules:
- No exclamation marks, emojis, hashtags or dashes.
- No contractions.
- No hype. Results are stated small and concrete: "we hear back more", not a big claim.
- No statistics or digits.
Does this sound like you? Change anything that does not.
What I could not learn from these: all three posts are on one topic and all use "we", so I do not know how you sound as "I", in an email, or when you are selling something. If you have one or two samples like that, paste them and I will fill in those lines.
Once it looks right, keep it: paste the profile into your business profile, a Project's instructions or a note. Then any new chat can use it without the samples, and you can paste a draft and ask me to make it sound like you.