The First Sentence Is a Promise
My first editor at the magazine was a terrifying woman named Diane who smoked at her desk (it was 2008, but still) and wore reading glasses on a chain like a librarian in a horror movie. She taught me more about writing in six months than four years of journalism school had managed.
Her most important lesson was this: she'd take my drafts, read the first sentence, and either keep reading or hand it back. That's it. One sentence. If it didn't work, nothing else mattered.
"The first sentence is a promise," she said, cigarette ash threatening my copy. "You're promising the reader that their time won't be wasted. If the promise is boring, they'll never find out if you kept it."
I think about Diane every single time I write. Which is inconvenient, because she was genuinely frightening, but also extremely useful.
What the first sentence actually does
The first sentence has one job: earn the second sentence. That's it. It doesn't need to summarize the whole piece. It doesn't need to contain your keyword. It doesn't need to define the topic. It just needs to make someone want to keep reading.
And yet, here's how most marketing content begins:
"In today's fast-paced business environment, companies are increasingly looking for ways to..."
I fell asleep typing that. I literally took a nap in the middle of that sentence. I had a dream about a beach and everything.
Compare that with how Ann Handley opens her book Everybody Writes: with a story. A specific, human, recognizable story that makes you think, "Oh, I know exactly what she's talking about."
That's the promise. Not "I'm going to teach you about content marketing." The promise is "I'm a human being talking to you like a human being, and this is going to be worth your time."
The first sentence isn't a summary. It's an invitation. And nobody RSVPs to a boring invitation.
The three promises that work
After fifteen years of writing and editing and reading thousands of first sentences (both brilliant and catastrophic), I've noticed that the ones that work tend to make one of three promises:
1. "Something surprising happened." This is the story opening. You drop the reader into a moment. "I once lost a $2 million client because of a semicolon." (I didn't, but you'd keep reading if I had, wouldn't you?)
2. "Something you believe is wrong." This is the contrarian opening. "You don't need a content strategy." Now you have to keep reading because either I'm about to say something smart or something incredibly stupid, and either way you're curious.
3. "I'm going to tell you something specific and useful." This is the direct opening. "Here's the email template that got me a 40% response rate." No story, no contrarian hook, just a clear promise of value. This works when the value is genuinely specific.
What doesn't work is the generalist windup. The "In today's landscape" sentence. The "Content marketing is important" sentence. These aren't promises. They're throat-clearing. They're the written equivalent of saying "so, yeah, um" before getting to the point.
How I practice this
When I'm working on a piece, I usually write the first sentence last. I know that sounds backwards, but hear me out.
I write the whole draft first, messy and imperfect, just to figure out what I'm actually trying to say. Then, once I know what the piece is really about, I go back and write the first sentence. Because now I know what promise I'm making.
It's like cooking. You don't set the table before you know what you're serving. (Every essay I write has a cooking analogy. I apologize for nothing.)
I also keep a file of great first sentences I've encountered. Not to copy them, but to study the mechanics. How does this sentence create momentum? What's the specific technique? Is it a question? A contradiction? A vivid image?
Here's one from Bernadette Jiwa that I love: she opens with observations so precise that you feel seen. Not dazzled by cleverness. Seen. That's the highest form of the first-sentence promise: "I understand you."
The editing trick
Here's a practical exercise. Take your last five blog posts. Read only the first sentence of each one. No context, no headline, just the opening line.
Now ask yourself: Would I keep reading?
If the answer is "probably not," don't panic. That's most content. That's the default. The default is boring because boring is safe and safe is comfortable and comfortable is the enemy of anything worth reading.
Now rewrite each of those first sentences. Make them specific. Make them human. Make them a promise that's worth keeping.
You'll be amazed at how much it changes the rest of the piece. Because when you start with a strong promise, you write differently. You write like someone who has something to say instead of someone who has a slot to fill.
Every piece of content you write is asking someone to give you the most valuable thing they have: their attention. The first sentence is where you prove you deserve it.
Diane retired in 2015. I heard she moved to Vermont and took up pottery. I hope she's happy up there. I also hope she knows that every time I write a bad first sentence and delete it, I see her face, reading glasses glinting under fluorescent light, handing my copy back without a word.
Some promises you make to terrifying editors. You keep those forever.