The AP Stylebook: Grammar Rules You Need To Know — Part 2
If you read my previous post, I detailed important Associated Press Stylebook rules that could be helpful for your business writing, in order to improve clarity and quality. Here are a few more important basics to add to that list:
Numerals
As I mentioned in Part 1, spell out numbers one through nine and use numerals for 10 and above. However, there are some exceptions to this rule. Here are a few to note:
- Use figures with ages — for people, animals or objects.
- The boy is 8 years old.
- The 2-month-old puppy fell asleep.
- The house was 27 years old.
- Use figures for measurements/dimensions, but spell out measurement terms. (Instead of ft. or in., use feet and inches.)
- 2 inches, 36 feet, 12 yards, etc.
- The recipe required a 12-inch-by-12-inch pan.
Examples:
Examples:
Spelling
- cancel, canceled, canceling, cancellation — note that all forms use only one “l” — except for cancellation
- complementary — blends well together/harmonious
- The kitchen’s design had complementary paint colors and lighting.
- complimentary — referring to something that is free
- Attend our complimentary breakfast.
- discreet/discrete — discreet means to be cautious, while discrete refers to something being separate
- friend, follow, like — no need to use quotation marks when referring to these common social media terms
- Google Plus — not Google+ or G-Plus
- homeowner — one word
- livable — not liveable
- premier/premiere — use premier when referring to excellence or high quality; use premiere (with an “e”) to refer to a first showing/opening of a performance
- selfie — no need for quotation marks
- retweet — one word; do not hyphenate
- United States — U.S. (with periods) can be used in body copy, but write US (without periods) in headlines. Also, USA is written without periods in all cases.
- well-being — always hyphenate
States
State names should be spelled out in the body of the text. (Note that datelines use abbreviations, but there are also exceptions to this rule.)
Example: Straight North is headquartered in Downers Grove, Illinois.
Time
- a.m. and p.m. (lowercase with periods); not am and pm
- For time spans, a dash is preferred.
- Avoid these redundancies: “The store opens at 12 noon and closes at 12 midnight.” Instead, you should write: “The store opens at noon and closes at midnight.”
Example: The meeting started at 3:15 p.m.
Example: 9-10 a.m.
Titles
- Titles for books, TV shows, songs, works of art, etc., should use quotation marks. However, magazines and newspapers do not need quotation marks.
- The class finished reading “To Kill a Mockingbird.”
- The kids watched the rest of “Frozen.”
- He recently had an article published in Forbes.
Examples:
Who vs. That
- Use who when referring to a person, that when referring to an object.
- Ed is someone who likes to eat.
- There are many businesses that reside in Chicago.
Examples:
Maybe you’ll come across one of these examples sooner rather than later. Remember that creating consistent content is an essential ingredient in establishing company credibility, which could be a deciding factor between a prospect becoming a lead or not.
Did any of these AP Stylebook rules surprise you? What grammar questions do you have? Feel free to list them below!
