Nonprofit Writing Style Guide Template [Free Download]
Establish Your Editorial Style to Save Time and Hassle
Blindsided.
That’s how the fundraiser felt when she read the email.
Her boss was warning her to NEVER use a rather ordinary word in any context ever again in an appeal —because a single donor didn’t like it.
Never mind that the appeal text came from their parent organization. Or the fact that it sailed through several rounds of reviews.
Yikes! No wonder fundraisers stay in their jobs an average of 16-18 months.
I’m sad to say this isn’t a rare occurrence. It happened to me multiple times as a nonprofit communications director.
Sometimes, I pointed out the absurdity (and added overhead cost) of tilting at the latest windmill. Other times I just shrugged it off with a well-practiced, zen-like indifference.
What’s a writing style guide?
But I think the best response is to introduce (or update) your editorial style guide. This handy reference is the less-flashy, but just-as-important companion to your branding standards.
A writing style guide is like a sports playbook. It tells anyone who writes or edits for you exactly what game they’re playing – so they don’t have to guess and risk the embarrassment of getting it wrong.
It contains the rules for things like your brand voice, tone, grammar, punctuation, structure and word preferences.
Now if you’re not a word nerd like me, this might seem boring. Maybe even unnecessary. But let me tell you, a well-crafted, well-used style guide is nothing short of a revolution!
Benefits of defining your editorial style
For your audiences, a writing style guide means your communications will be more consistent, recognizable and engaging. They can spend less time trying to figure out what you’re saying, and more time taking key actions, like donating.
And your staff could potentially save hundreds of hours spent on multiple rounds of edits, debates about using the Oxford comma and tip-toeing around that one board member’s insistence that you always use two spaces after a period.
When you don’t have documented editorial standards, people write and edit based on the “rules” they were taught in school. But many of these are outdated (See: two spaces after a period) or were always stylistic choices, not hard and fast rules.
Easy to use writing style template
My basic writing style guide template is all ready for you to customize so that it works well for your audiences and your organization. That’s the most important thing.
Feel free to add your must-have style points, delete things you don’t agree with, and make it your own. Or just use it as-is for now.
A few things to note:
Writing style guides should start with a recognized style book.
The Associated Press and the Chicago Manual of Style are two of the most common ones. In general, Chicago style is more formal and academic (with dozens of comma rules to follow), while AP is more straight forward.
If you happen to be in the Commonwealth, check out the Reuters Style Guide.
I’ve asked you to write a paragraph that describes your brand voice.
Are you direct, down-to-earth and approachable? Or are you intellectual and research-driven with a penchant for flaunting your vocabulary? If you get stuck, it might help to think of your brand as a specific person and what their relationship should be with your audience.
If you don’t know your brand personality already, then this may need to be a larger team discussion with executives and staffers from multiple departments. I’ve found this website to be a great conversation starter.
The good news is that you’ll be able to hear people’s different perspectives on the organization and the distinct needs of your audiences.
Something to watch out for is an executive or founder who finds it difficult to separate his or her own personality from that of the organization. Of course, this can work if the two personalities are compatible and tell a cohesive story.
But if your brand voice discussion hits a wall, then reach out to someone like me who can help your teammates think through their options and come to an actionable decision.
There’s a section of the style guide that’s begging for you to fill in the blanks.
This is the section that begins with “guidelines for word alternatives.” The polite way I’ve worded that section is intentional.
As a former journalist and human rights communicator, I’m generally not a fan of banning words. (Or the authoritarian regimes that do it.) But I’m all for suggesting alternative expressions that fit your specific nonprofit context and meet the expectations of your mass audiences.
But if you want these preferences to stick, you have to document these upfront, and regularly distribute them to all staff.
Also, a style guide should not set anyone up to be an undercover policeman, issuing tickets for grammar infractions and making people feel insecure about their writing chops. We all have pet peeves, but those shouldn’t stop otherwise well-written copy from going out the door.
Rather, editorial standards should clarify the common questions writers have. That frees them up to contribute more insightful content.
I created this writing style guide template as a general document.
I want it to be useful and customized by as many people as possible. However, it’s important to note that certain types of specialized writing defy the grammar, usage and style rules we learn in school. Fundraising, advertising and social media are definitely in this category.
So you may want to ask these folks to contribute their expertise to your guide. This will help air any creative differences – like starting sentences with “and” or “but” – before they ruin professional relationships.
Why shorter is better
Finally, I think it’s important to keep your writing style guide short, yet reasonably comprehensive. People will use a briefer document that answers their common questions, and that’s what matters.
After all, everyone in an organization has an important story to tell. Help them do it by documenting your writing style today!
That way, writing won’t just be for those of us who sleep with a copy of The Elements of Style under our pillows.
