Follow the Panda

Originally published in The Business Journal (formerly the Red River Buzz), September 2006

A panda walks into a café, orders a sandwich, eats it, then draws a gun and fires into the air. His confused waiter stops him. “Why?” he asks. The panda produces a badly punctuated wildlife manual and, as he heads for the door, tosses it over his shoulder.

“I’m a panda,” he says. “Look it up.” The waiter turns to the relevant entry and finds an explanation. Under “Panda,” he reads: “Large black-and-white bear-like mammal, native to China. Eats, shoots and leaves.”

This little joke comes from “Eats, Shoots & Leaves” by Lynne Truss. Chuckle-evoking, sure, but it underscores the importance of proper punctuation. Obviously, pandas don’t eat, shoot and leave; they eat shoots and leaves. The misplaced comma changes the whole meaning.

And that’s the point. Punctuation applied wisely and correctly can help an advertising and marketing writer convey meaning more clearly. More than that, it can add umph to copy to make it more interesting.

In his book, “Robert’s Rules of Writing: 101 Unconventional Lessons Every Writer Needs to Know,” Robert Masello points out that punctuation can inject inflection and expression. In Rule #86, he writes about those pesky dashes, hyphens, semicolons, periods and parentheses that, while they seem like so many details, make writing more distinctive.

“You can’t raise your voice on paper, not literally, but an exclamation mark can make your intentions plain. You can’t lower your voice on paper, not literally, but a parenthetical phrase allows you to slip in a sotto voce aside. A dash can do exactly what its name implies – pull your reader brusquely long – and a colon can bring him to a sudden stop…”

All of which can translate into more compelling, effective and memorable advertising and marketing materials.

On the other hand, improper punctuation can create confusion. Consider this theoretical company newsletter sentence:


• The clients, who received a demonstration, were excited about our new product’s potential.

• The clients who received a demonstration were excited about our new product’s potential.

Did all the clients receive a product demonstration and get excited, or only some of them?

Brochures, business letters, TV and radio scripts, annual reports, direct mail – in all, vigorously applied punctuation can positively impact your effort to get through to audience members.

So remember, (affect a syrupy backwoods voice here) punctuation is our friiiiieeeeennnndd. Rather than leaving it as the exclusive domain of your 8th grade schoolmarm, put it to work.

Make your writing clear and memorable; when working in black and white, follow the panda. But if he’s carrying a wildlife manual, duck.