The pen is mightier than the sword. So says an old adage, and it’s as true now as it was when the phrase was coined. In fact, in this day of instantaneous communication, with newspapers, newsletters, magazines, web sites, billboards and so much more, the written word is more important and more powerful than ever. We’ve expanded the power of the pen to include the power of the press and the power of the pixel, and multiplied it by millions of newsstands and billions of computers. 

The written word carries a legitimacy that mere speech does not. There is a qualitative difference between ‘I heard somewhere’ and ‘I read it in a newspaper’. It’s as if the very fact that the words were set down and published gives them the weight of fact that mere speech doesn’t carry. When words are written down, they become ‘knowledge’. When words are written down, they can be referred to in speech and other articles, they can be forwarded to others, they can be shared as they were written, without diluting the message or its original intent. The very permanence of the written word makes it more persuasive and believable.

This is both a good and a bad thing. On the one hand, a well-written article on a web site or in a magazine can help spread the word about important issues and discoveries. A single story in the daily newspaper can launch a landslide of reaction. That’s what happened in 1967 when advice columnist Abigail Van Buren published a simple letter from a soldier in Vietnam asking for ‘a letter from home’ to brighten the holiday season. In the forty years since that column was published, it’s been republished nearly every year. And over the years until 2001, it has generated hundreds of thousands of letters from home to servicemen in Southeast Asia, the Middle East, South America, Europe – in every field and every theater where there are American servicemen. In 2001, when Operation Dear Abby was suspended for fear of anthrax, the U.S. Navy and the columnist worked together to recreate it using email. The Operation Dear Abby mail servers saw 22 million hits in its first month of operation. That’s a lot of power and a lot of good to come from a few words in a few inches of newspaper column.

There is a flip side to the trust that we place in the written word, though. It depends on our belief that those who are writing the articles are presenting facts that have been checked, and presenting them impartially. A well-written persuasive article has the power to make people think, reconsider their positions, change their opinions on issues and facts. An expert in the art of article writing can pick and choose their facts, offer statistics to back up their assertions and present arguments that can convince the general public to believe, to act and to buy, whether the product is a new soda or a new opinion. The art of ‘spinning the news’ is viewed as one of the most important skills possessed by a public relations specialist.

Article writing has become a big part of business, both on the internet and for newspapers and magazines. Columnists who write for a syndicated audience reach millions of people with their work. A single article on a web site has the potential to reach tens of millions of people. If it’s written well it has the potential to change people’s minds and even, in some cases, to affect the flow of history. Thomas Paine’s pamphlet Common Sense, for instance, published in 1776 and distributed to over 120,000 colonists, is credited with reinforcing and sparking the events that culminated in the American Revolution.

Not all article writing has such lofty aspirations, of course. One of the most common bits of advice given to any marketer is to get his product mentioned in articles. Internet marketers know that the best way to bring people to their websites is to offer informational articles about the products that they sell. One of the best ways to convince people to buy a product is to present articles that support its use and benefits. Harnessing the power of the written word is a time-honored strategy to sell products and ideas, whether through news stories, magazine articles or web site copy.

Whether you’re a writer or a reader, understanding the power of the written word is vital. As a writer, it can help you to make your point effectively and accomplish your goal of persuading readers to your point of view. As a reader, it can help you to evaluate what you read, sift through the facts and make up your own mind. Accepting that written words have the powerful potential to change minds, and in the long run, the world, is the first step to bringing about change.

Dal Hayer writes featured articles for http://www.thearticleblogs.com/

Article Source: http://www.thearticleblogs.com

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