800-CEO-READ Blog

The Ehrenfeld Principle

A few weeks back we hosted an author pow-wow (pictures here). [I can't tell even begin to tell you how much is gained by personally knowing the people behind emails and phone calls.]

One of our pow-wow-ees was John Moore. A takeaway from him is what he dubs "The Ehrenfeld Principle." [You may recognize the name from one of our regular contributors.] What's this principle?

That’s my name for something I learned from business writer Tom Ehrenfeld at the recent 800 CEO READ Author Pow-Wow. During one of the sessions, Tom outlined his "WHAT? | SO WHAT? | PROVE IT!" system to identify effective business writing.

The WHAT? is the content. The SO WHAT? is why the content matters. And the PROVE IT! provides the credibility.

It's a great way to simplify the selling of anything -- for authors, marketers, entrepreneurs, etc., etc. John used the principle to explain the new book The 12 Elements from Gallup Press.