Either/Or

Sunday, May 8, 2011

What's Wrong with It
This one isn't too hard to spot, but if you don't want to waste the time, I'll just go ahead and tell you: "Either" means "one or the other of two," so if you're using it to mean "one of three," you go to hell.

How to Fix It
Just replace "either" with "any." There are some other terms you could substitute for "any," but "any" is nice and short and conveys the sense of urgency the ad's going for.

Other Thoughts
You could take issue with using the number "3" instead of spelling it out (numbers one through nine are generally spelled out), but exceptions are typically made for headlines, ads, and some other instances for purposes of immediacy. The idea is to summarize the message in not only as few words as necessary but also in as few characters (likewise this is why you don't usually see compound adjectives, and thus hyphens, in headlines). But that's a topic for another day.