In an email from Stacked Marketer from October 2022, one of many newsletters I’ve been subscribed to over the past year… Saw this interesting bit about “Zero Drafts,” but the original source is a Twitter thread (yuck).

Originally I just did a copy/paste job of the entire section of the email, but here are the highlights:

• The “Zero Draft” is a writing tactic used to overcome writer’s block, used by bestselling author Fonda Lee.
• This approach involves writing without aiming for perfection, often resulting in rough and unrefined content.
• For example, characters in a Zero Draft might be underdeveloped and the setting may lack detail.
• Unlike typical rough drafts, a Zero Draft is more like an expanded outline, containing the critical elements necessary to advance the story or message.
• One example given: for a 1,500-word blog post, one could write a 500-word Zero Draft, focusing on key points while leaving space for elaboration later.
• This technique can be applied to many different types of writing such as landing pages, emails, etc.
• Zero Drafts help writers to start writing without pressure and make it easier to improve upon subsequent drafts.
• Zero Drafts can be in bullet-point form, serving as a guide for the final piece.
• Fonda Lee successfully used this technique while writing her award-winning fantasy trilogy, The Green Bone Saga.
• The technique is also used in writing the Stacked Marketer newsletter.

While I haven’t directly adopted this Zero Draft strategy myself, I have started using bullet points far more than I used to, as evidenced by what I just did. But, I did take part of this advice, and stopped aiming for perfection in my first drafts. I probably should adopt this Zero Draft strategy more seriously with my essays, though. It’s good to know that it works.