{"id":19,"date":"2026-10-11T20:25:19","date_gmt":"2026-10-11T18:25:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/demo.tooltje.be\/metropress\/how-to-write-a-standfirst-people-actually-read\/"},"modified":"2026-10-11T20:25:19","modified_gmt":"2026-10-11T18:25:19","slug":"how-to-write-a-standfirst-people-actually-read","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/demo.tooltje.be\/metropress\/how-to-write-a-standfirst-people-actually-read\/","title":{"rendered":"How to write a standfirst people actually read"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The standfirst is the short line under the headline. It has one job: tell the reader why this story is worth their next five minutes.<\/p><h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Promise one thing<\/h2><p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Name the surprise, the stake or the person. Two sentences at most. Avoid words like amazing or must-read; let the story earn them.<\/p><h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Keep the promise in the first paragraph<\/h2><p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">If the standfirst says the story is about money, the first paragraph should be about money. Readers notice when the promise and the opening drift apart.<\/p><h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Test it on a stranger<\/h2><p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Ask someone who has not read the piece to explain it back to you after reading only the headline and standfirst. If they can, you are done.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Two sentences that promise something and keep it. A short guide to the standfirst, with examples from the stories on this site.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":12,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"mp_hide_title":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-editorial"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/demo.tooltje.be\/metropress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/demo.tooltje.be\/metropress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/demo.tooltje.be\/metropress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/demo.tooltje.be\/metropress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/demo.tooltje.be\/metropress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/demo.tooltje.be\/metropress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/demo.tooltje.be\/metropress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/demo.tooltje.be\/metropress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/demo.tooltje.be\/metropress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}