How to say this catchy?

Factual Questions
1

Native speakers please advise: I’m correcting some subtitles and I’m trying to translate the name of a game show. Literally it says “if you said it well, you are halfway to victory”, or, “Gut gesagt ist halb gewonnen”.

I’d be grateful for any suggestions how to make this catchier / shorter. The following don’t seem to be it.
“half the battle is how you say it”
“saying it right is half the battle”
“well spoken is half won”
“well said, halfway there”

There must be something better but still more or less literal?

2

I think"half the battle" is a natural-sounding translation of the “halb gewonnen” part, but I’m not sure that there is any established English phrase that corresponds to all of it. I think if it were an English-language game show they’d use a more recognisable phrase with a related meaning, like “Gift of the Gab” or “Silver Tongue” or whatever.

3

Maybe “It’s All In How You Say It”; that’s fairly idiomatic, although it loses the word “half”.

4

Hm…

A phrase well said is a battle half won

Please note, this not a common US saying. I’m just trying to make it pithy while keeping the meaning.

ETA: for a game show name, I really like Hogarth’s suggestion, although it’s much less literal, it IS a common saying.

5

For a name of a game show? I’d probably call it “Say It Well”, or something like that.

6

I’d suggest “Speaking well is half the battle”.

7

Would you guys keep it down in this thread? I can’t hear myself think with all the “GI JOE!” sound bites echoing around the board.

Hello Again’s got the pithiest saying so far.

8

I think “Speaking good is half the battle” has a much better ring to it.

And don’t get pithy with me.

9

"Speaking good"is not speaking well!

Unless the “halfway” part is literally true, and a key and prominent part of the structure of the game, I would drop it and go with one of the other suggestions that omit it. Or maybe just “Well said!”.

10

“Well said is half won.” The list in the OP dances all around this, but doesn’t use this exact combination of words. It’s as short as you can get and still retain the complete original meaning. It’s probably an exact translation of the German. It’s entirely one syllable words, which gives it a nice brisk flow. If you want what I think you want (catchy short translation), I don’t believe you can do better.

11

Half Wits

12

Thanks for the ideas.

That doesn’t sound bad. It covers the intention well enough. I may go with that one.

???

13

Shut the Fuck Up

14

Hogarth’s suggestion is the only one so far which sounds gameshow-y.

15

G.I. Joe* is a 1980s cartoon about U.S. Soldiers that always ended with a public service announcement. After imparting the practical lesson, it would always end with the following exchange:

Kid(s): “Now I [or we] know”
Soldier: “And knowing is half the battle!”

After this, the a short version of the theme music would play, the only lyric being the name of the show.

16

That is a literal translation and I think it works quite well.

Or, for a non-literal translation, how about Word Wars or Articulation? (You couldn’t use Articulate because there’s a board game with that name).

17

BTW, when you say catchy, do you mean catchphrase?

18

Oh right. Must have seen it, but didn’t remember.

Yes, “well said is half won” IS more literal, but when I google “(is) half won” I’m not sure it’s what a native speaker (US/UK) would say.

19

Most of us here are native speakers, and the full sentence would sound fine - poetic, rather than casual everyday speech, but that’s an advantage for a quiz show title.

20

Yeah, most of the suggestions here sound too literal for something that is supposed to be the title of a gameshow. In other words, they sounds like translated titles, rather than a clever or natural sounding name in English for a gameshow.