repetition of words: how to merge

Question

You understand that a good brand strategy and a strong advertisement strategy are the bases of a succesful advertising campaign.

How would one avoid the repetition of strategy?

...a strong brand and advertisement strategy..

This seems to imply you need a strong brand (not strategy) and any (not a strong) advertisement strategy

Would this be correct nevertheless?

Anything wrong with "strong brand and advertisement strategies?" — John Clifford, Commented Oct 14, 2016 at 9:01
Can this not also be interpreted as needing a strong brand and multiple (not strong) strategies? But it is allready way more clear, so I might use that. — Lara, Commented Oct 14, 2016 at 9:06
It could be, but that would be a really odd interpretation of it. Even your original example would be unlikely to be misinterpreted in the way you said, but this just makes it a bit less ambiguous. If you're really concerned, the repetition would probably be necessary to make it absolutely clear that both strategies should be strong, but I don't think it's needed in this case. (edit: to point out why mine is less ambiguous, consider the sentence "We need X" where X is an item from the list: "We need strong brand" makes no sense, so it's clearly meant to be a list of strong strategies). — John Clifford, Commented Oct 14, 2016 at 9:07
The word strategy seems to be repeated -- nothing is really repeated, though. Note that "brand strategy" and "advertisement strategy" are significant noun phrases with established definitions -- they are "terms," not incidental word pairs. — Kris, Commented Oct 14, 2016 at 10:20

Richard Kayser · Accepted Answer · 2016-11-29 02:47:49Z

1

Your sentence:

You understand that a good brand strategy and a strong advertisement strategy are the bases of a succesful advertising campaign.

One possible rewrite that avoids repeating the word "strategy:

You understand that strong strategies around branding and advertisement are the bases of a successful advertising campaign.

answered Nov 29, 2016 at 2:47

Richard Kayser

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JMP · Accepted Answer · 2017-04-28 10:40:54Z

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You can use strategy as an umbrella word to cover both branding and advertising as gerunds. Gerunds can take adjectives too!

So;

You understand that good brand and strong advertisement strategies are the basis of a successful advertising campaign.

; dropping the indefinite article as the the two singular objects are combined into a plural object.

answered Apr 28, 2017 at 10:40

JMP

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