{"id":2028,"date":"2023-02-14T13:54:06","date_gmt":"2023-02-14T13:54:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/revolutionsincommunication.com\/journalism\/?page_id=2028"},"modified":"2025-12-27T17:03:34","modified_gmt":"2025-12-27T17:03:34","slug":"how-to-leads","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/revolutionsincommunication.com\/journalism\/how-to-leads\/","title":{"rendered":"How to write news leads"},"content":{"rendered":"

There are two basic kinds of news leads in journalism: 1) Direct news leads, and 2)\u00a0 delayed or feature leads.<\/p>\n

Direct news lead:\u00a0<\/strong> A direct lead provides a quick summary of information. It uses the 5Ws of news: Who, what, where, when, why.\u00a0 For example:<\/p>\n

\u00a0WASHINGTON (AP) \u2014 The U.S. military on Saturday shot down a suspected Chinese spy balloon off the Carolina coast after it traversed sensitive military sites across North America.<\/p>\n

Be sure to:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Put the most important information (usually WHAT)\u00a0 first
    \n2. Stick to the facts and avoid opinion
    \n3. Use AP style and proper quote structure<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Delayed feature lead:<\/strong>\u00a0 Delayed leads provide insight, education, atmosphere, description and sometimes entertainment.\u00a0 This one is scene-setting.\u00a0 (Other feature leads might be narrative or anecdotal or first person or zingers).<\/p>\n

    Sept. 12, 2014. By Mike Gangloff,\u00a0 The Roanoke Times
    \nBLACKSBURG \u2014 All week the instruments came into LewisGale Hospital Montgomery \u2014 fiddles and\u00a0 banjos, guitars and mandolins, a lap dulcimer and an accordion and a bass, a triangle and a washboard and a set of bones.
    \nUp at the end of the fourth floor, in a room with a \u201cHigh Fall Risk\u201d sign on the door, the music carried on day and night. It would pause for a few hours, then burst out again as new players arrived: A days-long medley of old, traditional mountain tunes, Cajun waltzes and country two-steps, with a few hymns and a choogling acoustic rocker or two thrown in.
    \nBill Richardson was dying<\/span>, and he\u2019d invited all the musicians he\u2019d touched in decades of playing and\u00a0 organizing to come help him through it.<\/p>\n

    The lead (lede ) is everything, says Hannah Bloch.<\/a>\u00a0 “The lead’s job is to make the reader want to stay and spend some precious time with whatever you\u2019ve written. It sets the tone and pace and direction for everything that follows. It is the puzzle piece on which the rest of the story depends. To that end, please write your lead first \u2014 don\u2019t undermine it by going back and thinking of one to slap on after<\/em> you\u2019ve finished writing the rest of the story.”<\/p>\n