How to Write an Opinion Editorial Essay
An opinion editorial essay presents your own stance on a topic and seeks to persuade readers. In addition to writing a strong argument, you should also be able to support your position with well-researched facts and evidence.
First, make sure to select a topic that is current and important to your audience. This will help ensure that your essay has a clear hook and a solid foundation for your argument.
Focus on a Specific Issue
When writing an opinion editorial essay, it is important to focus on a specific issue. This will help you to make your points more relevant and believable to your audience. It will also give you a chance to show your unique voice and perspective.
Op-Eds are typically short – usually no longer than 800 words – so you have plenty of room to express your point of view and support it with facts and examples. They are often published in newspapers, but they can be found in online publications as well.
To write a successful Op-Ed, you should choose an issue that is controversial and has many different points of view. This will ensure that you will be able to spark conversation and debate.
Once you have chosen a topic, research it and determine whether or not it is worth discussing. This can be done through reading news relating to innovation, wars, diseases, pandemics, stock markets, or economy, and other topics that are relevant to your area of study.
Next, choose a topic that you are passionate about and can support with evidence and facts from your area of study or Major. This will allow you to write an opinion editorial that is credible, insightful and deep.
Using external sources can also add depth to your arguments and help you to stand out as a well-informed expert on a given topic. It will also make your essay easy to read and relatable to your audience, as the information you provide will be relevant and logical.
The lead paragraph is the first thing readers will see and it should describe the event, situation or issue that prompted you to write your piece in the first place. It could be a recent headline, a new statistic, a surprising fact or something personal that illustrates how the issue affects people.
Make Your Points Arguable
When writing an opinion editorial, it’s important to make your points arguable. This is because some readers may disagree with your stance on a particular topic, and it’s up to you to convince them that your view is right.
In order to make your points arguable, you need to state them clearly and quickly. It’s also a good idea to back them up with facts and examples.
Start your essay with a strong opening paragraph that grabs the reader’s attention and introduces a central point or argument. You can use a quote, anecdote or statistic to do this.
Then, move into supporting paragraphs that build on your lead, and end with a well-supported conclusion. This will help to establish credibility and ensure that your audience feels satisfied with the final result of your work.
Whether you’re writing an essay for school or a publication, it’s always a good idea to make sure that your opinions are grounded in sound research and factual information. It’s especially helpful to include scholarly studies when discussing controversial issues that are important to your audience.
You can also find credible first-hand accounts of a particular issue to support your arguments. For example, if you’re writing about smoking, it may be useful to include anecdotes from those who have died from using cigarettes.
You can also give suggestions and solutions that will help your readers to see the issue from a different perspective. This will encourage your readers to think critically and take action on their own.
Provide Well-Researched Evidence
The purpose of an editorial is to provide your opinion, which is why it’s important to use well-researched evidence to back up your claims. This will ensure that you’re providing readers with an accurate and unbiased overview of the topic at hand, and it’ll also help you decide which stance to take in your essay.
You can support your opinion with facts, research or anecdotes to demonstrate why your point is valid and what the consequences would be if it were not. However, be sure to explain each piece of evidence so that readers understand how it is related to your claim or thesis and why it matters.
If your opinion is based on personal experiences, religious beliefs or strong emotions, it’s important to do research to make sure you have reliable sources to support it. This will help to make your argument more credible and persuasive.
Adding new information to an existing debate can also be a great way to contribute to the conversation. Having new perspectives to offer will not only help your paper stand out, but it will also help to bring attention to issues that are currently not being discussed.
In addition to presenting well-researched facts, your evidence can also include direct quotations from authoritative sources. Quoting is an effective way to support your argument because it can seamlessly integrate into your essay and connect your opinion with credible evidence.
To get started on gathering evidence for your editorial, visit the reference desk at Davis or the Undergraduate Library and ask a librarian for advice. You can also chat with a librarian online (using the library’s IM screen name undergradref) to get tips on evaluating print sources.
Be Specific in Your Ledes
One of the most important aspects of writing an op-ed is to write a lede that grabs readers’ attention and makes them want to read on. A good lede should be concise and clearly state the main idea of your essay.
People have short attention spans, so you need to get to the point as quickly and effectively as possible. If you don’t, your readers will probably move on to something else.
You should also make sure your lede is relevant to the topic of your op-ed. For example, if your piece is on the subject of gun safety, you should begin with a news story about a recent shooting or another relevant event that relates to your opinion.
If you don’t have an interesting narrative hook in mind, you can use a news flash instead. This is a short and simple piece of content that will catch a reader’s attention, and it will hint at the more weighty argument and evidence to come later in your essay.
Ledes can be tricky, so it’s best to practice them until they become second nature to you. Then, you’ll know exactly what to do when you need to write a lede for your next article.
As a general rule, you should aim for at least three arguments that support your position in the lead of your newspaper editorial. These arguments should be backed up with facts and evidence from your research on the topic. You can use a combination of statistics, quotes from reputable sources, and your own personal experience to back up each point.
Make a Call-to-Action
If you are writing an opinion editorial essay, your goal should be to make a compelling case for why people should care about the topic and to encourage them to take action. You can do this by stating your opinions clearly and concisely, providing well-researched evidence and offering alternative solutions to the problem or issue you’re examining.
While there are many ways to accomplish this, one of the most effective is to use an opinion-based call-to-action that appeals to people’s specific emotions and drives them to action. For example, you could offer your readers a free download or a free coaching session.
A call-to-action can appear as a button, link within text or an image of some kind in your blog posts, advertisements, landing pages and social messages. It is a marketing technique that is widely used by marketers to convert traffic into email subscribers.
In the first paragraph of your editorial, start with a hook that encapsulates your main point. This can be a personal story or an interesting fact that ties in with the topic of your essay.
Next, explain how your point is relevant to the reader’s life or to their specific needs. For example, if you’re writing about a specific controversial issue, such as the new school dress code, you might mention how it relates to your own experiences or how it affects your family.
In your final paragraph, state the action you want readers to take. You can ask them to contact the authorities, donate money or participate in a movement.