Frank Luntz Winning Quotations

There are certain aspects, and there are - there are 15 attributes of winners and winning slogans. "Which side are you on" sounds divisive, that you're on one side or the other, at a time when we actually want universality. We want unanimity.

I wrote "Win" for people on both sides, legitimately on both sides. If you're a Democrat listening to this right now, you - the whole playbook is in this book. If you're a Republican, and you're frustrated because Barack Obama is a great communicator, the playbook is in this book. And if you're a corporation who wants to satisfy his - their employees, how to do it is in this book. And finally, if you're an employee and you want to get a raise, whether at NPR or anyplace else, it's in this book.

When I wrote "Win," it only took about eight months, but eight months of sheer pain and suffering because every phrase that's in there - and there are about 130 specific linguistic recommendations - I had to test every one to make sure that it worked.

"Win" is about the specific use of specific words to connect you to your employer or employees, politicians to voters - and frankly, to help people win debates, have discussions, and improve the level of communication.

It's something that people who read my materials have asked me in the past. If you don't have principles - the last chapter of the book ["Win"] is all about winning with principles. It's all about applying words to good things, good people, good efforts. Without that inherent accuracy, then even the best words will still fail.

There are people who will be wanting to apply "Win" to their own, personal life. If you remember only one thing, and I'm going to do it right here, right now because I just happened to come to it, that phrase - if you remember only one thing - there are 125 specific language recommendations in "Win" that can make a difference in your day-to-day lives.

Richard Nixon's career certainly ended in failure but someone who won an election with 60 percent of the vote, won 49 out of 50 states, that makes his -up to that point - incredibly successful. The idea of winning 49 states, incredible.

Apple has a passion to deliver the most amazing, innovative - and, in fact, I got criticized because in "Win," there are at least 10 references to what Steve Jobs has done, and Apple's done, in that my editor said it's too much. But Apple is a passionate company.

There are about 50 or 60 recommendations [in "Win"] for how to communicate, not just the words themselves. All of them had to be tested. And in this short amount of time, it's just very time-consuming and very stressful to ensure that you get it right.