Prompt 4: Blogs vs Articles

By Lindsey Murphy

Style is important. I’m not talking about how well your shoes match your outfit, but rather your style of a particular piece of writing. Style can vary based on audience, purpose, and format. Today we are going to be looking at two different forms of writing focused on marketing: “Seth’s Blog” and “Marketing the Unpleasant Truth.”

Blogs are a fun way to write or read about a specific topic. For example, I am enjoying seeing all of the different blogs for class all focused on different career fields. I chose to write about Seth’s Blog because of how simplistic and fun it looked when I first clicked on it. His first post at the top of his page reads,”The opposite of ‘more.’ It’s not ‘less.’ If we care enough, the opposite of more is better.” I think this is very important in most blogs because in this day in age, we are always rushing through things and don’t want to read several large chunks when we can read something shorter that gets to the point fast. Most of Seth’s posts are short or medium sized with paragraphs consisting with only around three or four sentences. Other posts consist of long bullet pointed lists or short numbered lists with sentences. Seth is consistent with this short and sweet style and it also fits with his simplistic but bright appearance of his blog.

The scholarly article,”Marketing the Unpleasant Truth” possesses a style consistent with most scholarly writing pieces. The title is shown at the top, and below it lists the author, the newspaper it was written for, along with the place and the date it was published. The article is pretty long, but broken up nicely with many paragraphs, varying from one to four sentences throughout the piece. With around 1200 words, this piece of writing style definitely contrasts to Seth’s marketing blog motto of “less is more.” Yet, the article is nicely organized with a broad claim in the first sentence,”Brands are adopting a franker approach to advertise their highly personal products.” Then the author uses several different examples and quotes to explain this claim. This style of writing is good for people who would like a large amount of information on a specific topic.

Godin, Seth. "Seth's Blog." Seth's Blog. N.p., n.d. Web. 19 Feb. 2017.

Rigby, Rhymer. "Marketing the Unpleasant Truth." Financial Times [London] 23 May 2013: n. pag. Web. 19 Feb. 2017. <http://search.proquest.com.proxy1.cl.msu.edu/docview/1354441084?pq-origsite=summon>.