Analyze that

“That” is a funny word. Not funny ha-ha, but funny in the sense (that) a lot of people think (that) you need to use it when you don’t.

As my fellow copywriters will attest to, one of the items on the job description is being able to edit your own copy. Not with a machete like account people or clients are prone to do, but with a scalpel. What’s usually required is a surgical, precision paring down of the word count to bring whatever brilliant idea it is into sharper focus. And down to time.

For me, the first place (that) I direct this effort is at “that.”

I don’t think (that) there are a lot of words as expendable as “that.” I know for a fact (that) most agency proofreaders don’t agree with me at all about this. They think (that) they’re not doing their job unless they put back all the “thats” (that) I’ve taken out.

Apparently it's true (that) proofreaders are paid by the word.

Anyway, next time you’re writing a letter, note, list, blogpost, copy or whatever, when you go through it to make revisions and fine tune it to a sharp, brisk read, the first place I’d start with is “that.” You may have already noticed (that) all the “thats" in parenthesis are completely unnecessary.

Now that I re-read it, the same might be said for this post.