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Bo Sanchez of Kerygma: What You can Learn from Him about Writing

First, an introduction. For those of you who do not know Bo Sanchez, he is a Filipino preacher, founder of several organizations, and an author of several books on religion and business. If you want to know more about him, I suggest you check out Bo Sanchez’ online bio first.

That out of the way, let’s talk about what you can learn about writing from Bo Sanchez.

I first recognized Bo as a preacher because my mother’s a subscriber of Kerygma magazine, which he founded. But as I went on reading his pieces on the magazine and getting forwarded emails of his blog posts, I couldn’t help but notice how well he wrote. I became a fan boy of sorts soon enough.

And because I believe in becoming a better writer by reading works of good writers, let me show you what you can learn from Bo Sanchez about writing:

1. He’s a natural story-teller. This quality is a must for any preacher, so that’s not so surprising that he’s a natural story-teller too. Good story-telling hooks the audience to what the preacher or speaker is saying. Without it, the whole session would be utterly boring.But more than keeping the audience from sleeping, good story-telling makes whatever the speaker is saying easier to remember. Don’t you think it’s easier to remember Aesop’s fable of the dog and his bone than the concept of being contented with what you have?And good writers must be good story-tellers too. And by story-telling I mean these things: your pieces should be easy to remember, well-structured, easy to digest and it flows smoothly.
2. He has a sense of humor. Take a look at most of the blogs out there. They’re overly serious and they tend to bore you to death. While there are some topics that need to written with a certain degree of seriousness, you shouldn’t be too serious if you’re writing blog posts or feature articles. Your readers would appreciate a dose of humor from time to time.And that’s another thing that makes Bo an engaging writer, even if he’s writing about religion, something that’s heavy stuff for most people. His humor gets you hooked even further to what he’s saying. Combine humor with a good story and you can be pretty sure it will spread virally better than overly-serious pieces.Why? Because people love sharing good stories and funny stories. You don’t need to look further for proof for that. Just look into your email’s inbox or your text messages. What type of messages do you tend to keep and share? I’m pretty sure they’re the funny ones.
3. He has a clear and solid call to action. First, let me tell what a call to action is. In direct-response copywriting, it’s the part where you tell your customers to take the action that you want them to take. Do you want them to buy your product? Do you want them to call you for a free consultation? Your command for them to act is what’s called a call to action.How does it fit into your writing? You can use call to action in your writing in different ways, depending on what action you want your readers to take. You could tell them to subscribe to your RSS feed, or post a comment, or send you an email for your feedback.Bo Sanchez uses this method effectively. Look at the end of most, if not all, of his posts in his blog or his articles in Kerygma. He tells you to subscribe to his blog, say a prayer, etc. And sure enough, you’ll do as he says, if he’s provided you with something useful or inspiring to read.

   If you want your readers to take a certain action, all you have to do is ask. And that’s what a call to action does.

There you have it, the things you can learn from Bo Sanchez about writing. I’ll stop here before I get accused of being overly patronizing.

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