Style Guide

Tone and voice

This is how we communicate our personality. The tone we use tells users how we feel about our message, and how we want them to engage with us.

Here’s how we talk about Paskill:

• We’re smart, but approachable.
• We’re passionate and inspiring about the future of higher education, while being knowledgeable and action-oriented about the challenges we face.
• We use plain-language to communicate to our audience, but we always make sure we’re using industry terminology when appropriate. We walk a fine line between being experts in our field and using unnecessary jargon.
• We strive for best practice in readability based on the Flesch-Kincaid model. That’s a reading ease score over 50 and an 8-10th grade reading level.
  • Using industry terminology will likely push copy closer to a 12th grade reading level. That’s ok! Try to use plain language throughout the rest of the copy to find a good balance.
• We use the active voice whenever possible.

Casing

Headlines (or H1 tags) should be written in title case (all the major words capitalized). Headlines shouldn’t end in punctuation.

• Example: What We Do

All subheads (H2, H3, H4, etc.) should be written in sentence case (only the first letter of the first word is capitalized). Subheads shouldn’t end in punctuation, unless a question mark is needed.

• Example: Challenges we solve

Navigation options should be written in title case.

All CTAs, links, and button copy should be written in sentence case.

Button copy shouldn’t end with punctuation.

• Example: See all work

Punctuation

Commas

Use the Oxford or serial comma when writing lists.

• Example: We’re hiring in sales, product, and finance.

Ampersands

Avoid using (&) unless it’s in a brand name, navigation item, or is part of a service/specialty name. The only exception is for social ads when brevity is needed for character count.

Plus sign

Don’t use “+” to mean “and” unless used in social ads when brevity is needed for character count.

Apostrophes

When making a possessive from a noun ending in -s, use only an apostrophe.

• Example: This is Charles’ project.

Colons and semicolons

Use sparingly. Consider rewriting a sentence if it requires a semicolon or colon. Options include using an em-dash or starting a new sentence.

Contractions

Use contractions for common phrases to make our writing sound less formal and more approachable.

• Example: doesn’t, hasn’t, etc.

Dashes and hyphens

Em-dash

Use the em-dash (—) to offset an aside in the sentence. Don’t use spaces before or after the em-dash.

• Example: They aren’t adjusting the entire schedule—only this month.

En-dash

Use the en-dash (–) to connect a range of numbers or dates.

• Example: We’re open from Mon–Thurs.

Hyphen

Hyphens should be used for compound modifiers or when writing out numbers between twenty-one and ninety-nine. They shouldn’t be used in place of an em or en dash.

Ellipses

Use spaces before and after an ellipsis.

• Example: Hmmm … something went wrong.

Exclamation points

Use sparingly. Don’t use multiple exclamation points in one sentence.

Acronyms

Don’t use periods in common acronyms.

• Example: US, UK, IRS, NASA, JPL

Other style tips

Acronyms

When using an abbreviation, introduce the acronym in parentheses on the first mention.

• Example: Our conference will be held at the Acme Convention Center (ACC).

Capitalization

Using ALLCAPS is bad for readability. Only use it if you are writing an acronym, or formatting requires it (in button copy, for example).

Capitalize titles preceding names, but use lowercase after names.

• Example: Our Director of Marketing Jane Doe is excited to meet you. John Doe, director of marketing, will be joining us.

Use all lowercase when writing out an email address or website URL.

Currency

No space between $ and the number. Use commas to separate millions and thousands. Spell out millions, billions, trillions.

• Example: We spent $10,000. But the total cost was $7 million.

Dates/months/years

• Short dates: MM/DD/YYYY
• Long dates: Month DD, YYYY
• Don’t use ordinals with dates: 3^rd, 2^nd, December 5^th, 1984

Numbers, fractions, units

Spell out numbers zero to nine and use figures for 10 and up.

If a number appears at the beginning of a sentence, always spell it out.

When writing out telephone numbers, use dashes.

• Example: 215-572-7938

Time

Use figures except for noon and midnight.

Write a.m. and p.m. in lowercase, include a space after the hour and use periods between the letters.

• Example: 3:30 a.m.

For times on the hour, don’t include minutes.

• Example: 11 p.m., 9-11 a.m.

Bulleted lists

Introduce the list with a short phrase or sentence, followed by a colon.

• Example: Our partners are: or These are our partners:

Capitalize the first word following the bullet.

Only use punctuation if the bullet is a full sentence.

Use parallel construction for each item in the list.

• Start with the same part of speech for each item (in this example, a verb).
• Use the same voice (active or passive) for each item.
• Use the same verb tense for each item.
• Use the same sentence type (statement, question, exclamation) for each item.
• Use just a phrase for each item, if desired.

Not seeing the style tip you need?

When in doubt, defer to AP style.