General
What is the hierarchy in terms of style guides: Associated Press, Brand Style Guide (i.e., Forbes, Rolling Stone, etc.) and CCO’s in-house style guide?
Editors should first refer to CCO's in-house style guide, then the brand style guide if it's not in our in-house guide, then the AP.
What form of punctuation is OK at the end of a headline?
Question marks are OK, but no periods or exclamation points at the end of headlines.
What is the hard character limit for Forbes article headlines?
110 characters is the hard limit, whereas 65-75 characters is preferred. However, Bertie limits headlines to 70, so this has become our de facto soft headline limit.
What dictionary does AP refer to for spellings?
Merriam-Webster, AP’s new primary dictionary source.
What spelling do we use in articles?
American English
With their treatment of em dashes, Forbes and Rolling Stone differ. What approach does each publication take?
Forbes: No spaces around an em dash. Rolling Stone: One space on each side.
True or false: For Forbes, you should add an acronym in parentheses immediately following the first use of a lesser-known word, phrase or organization?
True!
Per AP style, which of the following words contains a hyphen: email or ebook?
“Email” has no hyphen, “e-book” does.
What word should never follow something like "10 Tips" in a headline or subhead?
Tips should always be followed by “on” or “for,” never “to.”
Ampersands are generally not allowed, but there are two exceptions—what are they?
Ampersands can be used when part of a brand name or a standard acronym (e.g., Ben & Jerry’s, M&A) or in search headlines for Forbes if short on space.
Forbes adds periods between U.S. and the U.K. Does Forbes apply the same treatment to the acronym for the United Nations?
No, UN does not have periods.
When should a formal title be capitalized per AP Style?
Capitalize formal titles when they are used immediately before a name (e.g., “President John Smith”). Lowercase and spell out titles when they are not used with an individual's name (e.g., “The president issued a statement.”)
When should you use a period at the end of a bullet?
When it’s a complete sentence. Use periods at the end of each sentence in a bulleted list; no punctuation at the end of a single word or short phrase. It’s best to introduce bulleted lists with a short phrase/sentence followed by a colon. Capitalize the first word of each bullet point. Make them all parallel.
When referring to academic degrees, two use apostrophes and one does not. Name the degree that does not use an apostrophe.
Associate degree is not possessive, but you use an apostrophe in “bachelor's degree,” “a master's,” etc. Similarly, there is no possessive in “Bachelor of Arts” or “Master of Science.”
Forbes dictates that titles for the following be italicized: movies, TV shows, books, periodicals, video games, podcasts. What is the one exception?
Forbes italicizes titles except when referencing film or video game franchises (e.g., “the Star Wars franchise” versus “Star Wars Episode IV”).
According to the AP, how should you refer to the social media company now owned by Elon Musk in articles?
As of June 2025, AP indicated that the shelf life on referring to X, followed by a “formerly Twitter” phrase, has expired. Now, it’s perfectly acceptable to say: The social platform X; or Posted on X, said in a post on X, etc.
For bolded lead-ins, you use sentence case and a period if it’s a complete sentence (Ex: “Check in with your employees. Leaders need to …”) How do you style the lead-in if it’s a fragment?
If it's a fragment, use serial caps and a colon, not a hyphen or dash. (“Offering Your Support: Begin by …”)
When should question marks, exclamation points, dashes, semicolons and colons be placed inside quotation marks?
If the quote contains that punctuation. If the punctuation applies to the entire sentence, it goes outside the quote. For example, if the quoted material isn't a question but the overall sentence is, put the question mark outside the quotation marks. (E.g., Did you say I “tried hard”?)
How does Forbes treat chemical abbreviations (Ex: H20)?
Currently, Forbes is using both H20 with no subscript and spelling out chemical names when they are longer. Use your best judgment.
If an article is referring to a specific version of OpenAI’s generative pre-trained transformer (generative text) software, AP dictates the use of a hyphen (Ex: GPT-3, GPT-3.5, GPT-4). How should you style the mention if the article is about a use case where the software requires a human to initiate the conversation?
Use “Chat” in front: ChatGPT or ChatGPT-3, ChatGPT-4, etc. If the article is about a use case where the software is embedded in another tool, which allows the secondary tool to automate a process based on a trigger, the software can be referred to as AutoGPT, AutoGPT-3, AutoGPT-4, etc.