Writing Basics:

The most important rules of writing are these:

● Good thinking is good writing
● Good editing is good writing
● Writing is a symptom of thinking

Think before you write, and edit out loud after you write. You can always make the first draft
better.

Always think and write from the reader’s perspective. Think about who you are writing for before
you write.

Don’t use a complex word when a simple word will do

Buy instead of purchase

Let instead of permit
Start instead of commence
..but are activating them in a more calibrated intentional manner...

Don’t use two words when one will do.

Instead of using a flashy adjective or adverb, use a better verb.

Avoid buzzwords wherever possible.

The American spelling is preferred to the British spelling.

Favorite, color, jewelry, learned, neighbor, analyze, organize

Do not use the same noun, verb, or adjective in the same sentence.

When there are more than two nouns in a sentence, do not use pronouns more than twice in a
row.

Bad: All business processes have deadlines associated to them, but many of them fail to
make them.
Better: All business processes have deadlines, but many fail to meet them.

Put the most important information in a sentence at the end. This leads the reader to the end of
the sentence.
Remove unnecessary words.

You may from time to time break any guideline in this section; but you must have a damn good
reason for doing it.

Article Guidelines
When submitting articles:
● Everything is left-aligned
● Use Arial point 11
● 1.15 line spacing with 10 point spacing between paragraphs
● Do not add a line break between paragraphs
● Use the H1 tag for the title of the article, H2 tags for section headings, and H3 tags when
giving multiple examples inside a section
● The title of the article (H1) should be in Title Case. The section headings/ subheadings
should be in Sentence case

External and internal linking

● Don’t use more than 2 external links, unless they are statistics.
● There need to be two internal links to the Kissflow website in the CTA section – One link
should direct to the Kissflow home page, another one to the specific silo we are writing
about. So, if the article is about Low-code, one link in the CTA will be directing to home
page and another to the Low-code landing page.
● The silo or use case is usually mentioned in the topic and usually means the same thing.
If the topic mentions more than one silo (ex. The role of low-code no-code technologies
in digital transformation) then please reach out and seek clarification.

Topics

Abbreviations
Unless the abbreviation is more common than the actual name (UN, UNESCO, NGO), always
write out an abbreviation the first time it is used followed by parentheses with the abbreviated
form. You may use the term BPM without any explanation.
Apostrophe and Contractions
When a word ends in an ‘s’ that requires a possessive, the final ‘s’ is omitted

Jonas’, ITProjects’

Contractions are fine to use in any form. However, do not contract the verb “to have” when it is
the main verb in the sentence.

Wrong: I’ve a question for you.

Right: I’ve asked you a question.

Bold Text
Only use bold text when you want to overemphasize something, often in a comedic or
over-the-top manner.

Book Titles
When referring to the title of a book, add italics.

Alain Hunkins describes this well in Cracking the Leadership Code.

Bullets
Use bullets when creating a separate subsection. Do not use numbers or letters (e.g. ‘1)’ or ‘a)’).

Keep bullet points to a single sentence and do not add final punctuation.

If bulleted sentences must extend to two sentences, then use final punctuation for all items, and
for all items on the entire page.

Capitalization
The following are always capitalized, regardless of the situation:

Names of countries and descriptors (Italy, Italian)

Days of the weeks
 Months of the year

The following are not capitalized (unless they are in a heading or the first word of a sentence)

Industries
Financial terms
Concepts
Departments (finance, procurement, administration)

Job titles are capitalized if they are referring to an actual person’s designation that would appear
on a visiting card:

He was the Business Development Manager at Cisco for twelve years.

...but not general designations:

If you are a business development manager, you’ll want to check this out.

Casing
● Sentence Case - The first letter of the first word is capitalized. All other words begin in
lower case unless it is a proper noun, or follows a different grammar rule.
● Title Case - Capitalize every word, unless all of these conditions are met:
○ It is an article, preposition, or conjunction
○ It is three letters or less
○ It is not the first or last word
○ Examples:
■ a, an, and, by, for, in, of, on, or, so, the, to
○ Note:
■ All verbs, including helping verbs and phrasal verbs are always
capitalized, including is, are, has, can, and be
○ For hyphenated words that appear in titles and section headings, capitalize both
parts, e.g. Time for Some Self-Assessment

The most important principle is to maintain consistent casing across the user experience.

Lean towards using sentence casing in most situations and title casing only when absolutely
required.
Commas
Include a comma between the last two items in a list.

They will focus on branding, training, and increased sales.

Dashes
When using a dash to trigger a reader to pause while reading, use the em dash –. Use a space
before or after the dash.

Developers thought they had found the problem – until they realized it was bigger than
they thought.

Date and Time Formats

● Dates
○ 28 February 2019
○ 5 March 2019
○ 10 September 2020
● Time
○ 10:35am
○ 4:35pm

Hyphens and Hyphenated Words

Hyphens can be used when combining adjectives that describe the same noun.

● Hyphenated words and examples

○ Fast-moving
○ Technology-driven
○ Best-in-class
○ Better-than-expected
○ Real-time
○ End-to-end
○ Built-in
 ○ On-premise
○ Read-only
○ ready-made
○ Low-code and no-code are always hyphenated and follow sentence-case
○ Drag-and-drop is hyphenated when used as an adjective. No hyphen when used
as two verbs together
■ Kissflow uses drag-and-drop technology in its forms.
■ It couldn’t be easier, just drag and drop!
● Words not hyphenated
○ Coworkers
○ Use Sign in, not Sign-in or Signin - when used as a noun or verb
○ Use Sign out, not Sign-out or Signout - when used as a noun or verb
○ Email, not e-mail
○ Autopopulate
○ Autosave
○ Ad hoc
○ Lifecycle
○ eBook

Kissflow Specific Terminology

The product as a whole is called Kissflow.

Latin Endings
Meanings
● etc. = “and so on”
● i.e. = “that is”
● e.g. = “for example”

If you use the phrase “such as”, “including”, or “like” in a sentence, do not include “etc.” at the
end of the list.
You can find all kinds of junk food like pizza, potato chips, or burgers.
They ate anything they wanted – pizza, potato chips, burgers, etc.
There are many types of junk food such as pizza, potato chips, or burgers.
I love all junk food, e.g. burgers, potato chips, pizza.
Numbers

General
Numbers should be written out up to twenty. After that, they should be symbols.

There are 25 new product lines in the works, but only thirteen will be selected.

All numbers (including currencies) below one million should include all the digits along with a
comma to show the thousands place. Numbers one million and above should always include the
initial digits and then the word ‘million’ or ‘billion’. In this case, a decimal should be used instead
of a comma, and no more than two digits after the decimal.

They have proposed to open 240,000 new outlets.

They have estimated the market size to be 2.6 million

Currency
The symbol ‘$’ should be used for dollars, without any prefix.

Percentages
Use digits for the numbers and write out the word percent. Do not use the symbol (%). Do not
say “16 percentage”.

The company achieved the 16 percent growth target.

Point of View
Most articles should be written in second person, directly addressing the audience you are
trying to reach.

Never write in first person unless you are the authority on the topic. This includes 1st person
plural (“we”).

Journalistic articles can be written in third person.

Punctuation in Headlines and Headings
Single sentences should not end in any punctuation unless it is a question mark or exclamation
point. If two sentences are used, punctuation is added to both sentences.

Ready to destroy your BPM?

Here’s how to destroy your BPM
Destroying your BPM? Not so fast.

If a section heading is written as a dialogue, it should be written in sentence case, e.g. ...but
what about my data?

Quotation Marks
Double quotation marks are used when you are directly quoting someone else’s speech or text.
Offset the quote with a comma and keep any final punctuation inside the quote.

The new clients asked, “Are you extremely satisfied?” Everyone was astonished.

Single quotation marks are used when referring to terminology (often dubious). No comma is
needed and final punctuation should be outside the quote marks.

Only a magnetic workplace that continues to attract talent can sustain the generation of ‘job
hoppers’.

Do not use quotation marks to emphasize a term or try to make it stand out.

Slash
In most cases, there are no spaces before or after a slash:
The product is useful for companies/organizations
The product is useful for Chief Technology Officers/Heads of Departments
Some exceptions can be made, but very rarely. For longer phrases separated by a slash, rewrite the
sentence so as not to use the slash.

Split Infinitives
Make sure not to never do it :-)
 Wrong: You should be able to easily add a branch and create conditional tasks.
Right: You should be able to add a branch and create conditional tasks easily.

Symbols
Do not use the ‘&’ symbol to mean ‘and’ unless it is part of a company name.

Tense
Avoid the progressive and perfect tenses where possible. Opt for simple past and simple
present.

NOT The company had done a study; The company did a study.
NOT They will be growing at 8 percent. They will grow at 8 percent.

Versus
Versus should be written as vs.
The cloud vs. on-premise debate is pretty much over.

Voice
Use active voice rather than passive.

The directors decided to move forward with the marketing plan.

NOT The marketing plan was decided by the directors.

Which, That, Who

Many times, the connecting word that can be removed and the meaning of the sentence stays
the same. Where it cannot, that is preferred. If what follows is a complete independent clause,
which can be used. When referring to a person, who is best.

Many of their competitors demonstrated that there is more scope to grow.

They chose the distribution plan that seemed the best.
The new company, which is valued at $45 million, will be a great addition.
They gave a bonus to the salesman who made the deal.
Words and Phrases to Avoid
● Watch out for using “to be” (in all its forms) as the main verb in the sentence. Try to find
a more powerful verb.
● Avoid starting sentences with gerunds (“-ing”). It’s a complicated construction in English.
○ Especially don’t start a sentence with “Being”
● 95% of the time, it’s incorrect to use “the” in front of a plural noun
○ “Business users rely on the IT teams…”
● Avoid the words “this/that” as a start to a sentence. Find a more elegant way to connect
your thoughts.
○ “This is because”
● “...which is why”
○ “this is why”
○ “that is why”
○ And that’s why…
● Watch out for long strings of prepositional phrases
● Today, “in this age”, “in today’s world”
● “go for” (write “choose” instead)
● “would be” (use “is” if possible)
● “Thing” - be more descriptive
● “As opposed to”
● When defining a term, don’t use these:
○ ...is nothing but...
○ ...is when…
○ ...is that…
○ ...that means that…
● “the same” - “Revert to me on the same”
● “Means” -
● ...the below…
● ...is one of…, ...is one such…, one among
● The answer is...
● With respect to
● That is the question
● Respective
● Rightly said
● After all
● In this article
● Now,
● So,
● It is essential that
● Needless to say