"Luntz' forte is constructing the phrase that persuades -- always a skill in demand in Corporate America." --Businessweek Magazine
"Words That Work deserves an attentive read. Mr. Luntz offers a fair amount of good advice to anyone who must communicate publicly -- most important, "be the message." By this he means that if you want to talk the talk and be believed, you must walk the walk -- which is to say, you must mean what you say and act on it. Integrity sells.
"As the book develops, Mr. Luntz's "words that work" turn out to be portals for his clients to think hard about what they and their opponents stand for and how to align their positions more closely with what their audiences actually care about. This isn't hocus-pocus. It's just the result of hard work, careful thought and empathy -- the staples of all intelligent public discourse." --Wall Street Journal
"Few political consultants can boast as many strings to their bow at such a young age as Frank Luntz. When he was barely in his thirties, the Republican wordsmith played a critical role in devising the Contract With America, which helped Newt Gingrich's Republican party win control of both houses of Congress for the first time in more than a generation . . .
"It is a fair bet that Luntz will play an influential role in the 2008 election, possibly in service of his old friend the former mayor of New York.
"Words That Work is Luntz's attempt to distil what he insists is his intrinsically honourable profession between two covers. To a large extent it works. Even where Luntz is protesting a bit too loudly -- that negative attacks on political opponents rarely work, for example, and that, by implication, Luntz has never been involved in such skulduggery -- he is always readable.
"Part lexicographic memoir, part self-help book, Words That Work shines when the accent is on the former. It is hard to think of any other political consultant in America who has coined as many effective slogans as Luntz. Some, such as his branding of the estate, or inheritance, tax as the "death tax", have remoulded conventional wisdom with devastating effect on their principally Democratic defenders.
"Others have crept into common usage less dramatically but just as effectively. Take "exploring for energy" instead of "drilling for oil", "tax relief" in place of "tax cuts", or "not giving" emergency hospital care to "illegal aliens" instead of "denying" it to "undocumented workers". Words, or rather the slicing and dicing of them to fashion our subliminal responses, do work, particularly when tried and tested in Luntz's two-hour "dial sessions", where volunteers convey their responses by turning a dial up or down in reaction to what they are seeing and hearing.
"Luntz has produced a fine book that teaches us a great deal about politics in today's America and about the minutely analysed mindset of the electorate. That Luntz's words are effective there can be little doubt." --Financial Times
"One of the nation's leading pollsters and political language specialists." --Washington Post.com
"Change "estate tax" to "death tax" and you see how words pack an emotional punch. Luntz knows about delivering word blows" --Investors Business Daily
"The pollster has a long track record of identifying the phrases that make or break political and corporate campaigns . . . So when he makes such observations, American politicians listen." --The (London) Sunday Telegraph
"Dr. Luntz, you are a freaking genius. I`ve said this before. Dr. Frank Luntz, we`ll give you the full appellation there, and that`s the right word. Dr. Frank, I`m going to call you from now on, like Dr. Phil. The book is called Words That Work and you`re always right." --Chris Matthews
"Language is like music. Unfortunately, the Republicans have a Paul McCartney in the person of Frank Luntz. Somehow, we Democrats got stuck with Yoko Ono." --Al Franken
"Frank Luntz understands the power of words to move public opinion and communicate big ideas. Any Democrat who writes off his analysis and decades of experience just because he works for the other side is making a big mistake. His lessons don't have a party label. The only question is, where's our Frank Luntz?" --Senator John Kerry
"If you can't afford to hire Frank Luntz, you have to read Words that Work." --Steve Wynn
"Words can injure our egos and inflame our hearts. They can shape our beliefs, impacting the actions of generations to come. For the last 15 years, Frank Luntz has been behind some of the most important words ever spoken… this book is no different – a MUST read!" --Tony Robbins
"The media made a linguistic Svengali out of GOP wordsmith Frank Luntz, who was credited with getting the Republicans to adopt phrases such as ‘opportunity scholarships’ for vouchers and ‘climate change’ for global warming. Wherever you went, Democrats were talking about the importance of ‘framing’ and ‘re-messaging’." --Los Angeles Times
"Words are enormously important to me. I love language, the sheer pleasure of words in the right order. Frank Luntz is brilliant about words." --Rudy Giuliani
"Great words can accomplish great things. If you really want to capture
the power of communication, "Words that Work" can help you." --Frederick W. Smith, Chairman & CEO, FedEx Corporation
