5 steps to simplifying your message
How can you clarify your message?
The authors of “Complex to Clear: Managing Clarity in Corporate Communication” developed this CLEAR mnemonic for simplifying your subject:
Readability
Measure, manage & report readability
4 more ways to use reading ease
Paying attention to readability will help you reach readers, improve communication and boost the bottom line. It can also help you manage writers, win debates during the approval process and report measurable communication success.… Read the full article
A world of hurt
Global literacy is falling. What’s a communicator to do?
Read it and weep: After decades of reporting five levels of literacy, the largest adult literacy study in the world has dropped Level 5, the top level, for lack of participation.… Read the full article
Concrete/comprehension connection
Researchers find a 1:1 correlation
Which of these passages is easier to understand?
| Abstract | Character cannot be summoned in a crisis if it has been squandered by years of compromise and excuses. |
Hit Return more often
People skip long paragraphs
Readers take measure of — and make decisions about — your copy based on how it looks. One of the most important visual cues is paragraph length.… Read the full article
Are press releases dead? No!
Long live the release
Twitter has never issued a news release. Amazon introduced the Kindle through a series of tweets. Google announced Alphabet via a blog post from Larry Page.… Read the full article
Three ways to streamline sentences
Cut a word, increase comprehension
Here’s the problem with long sentences: Every time you add a word, you reduce comprehension.
Let your sentences sprawl, and the subject, verb and object get too far away from each other.… Read the full article
Your brain on wordplay
We pay attention to and remember puns, alliteration
A hand shoots up in my Make Your Copy More Creative workshop.
“But,” the communicator says, “don’t you risk confusing people with wordplay?”… Read the full article
Shatter the pyramid
Another communicator takes on the feature
Too many communicators married the inverted pyramid when they were 19, have made a lot of triangular babies and have remained monogamous for all these years.… Read the full article
What closet tidying taught me about editing
Audition your words to go in, not out
When Lynn Wylie, aka Best Sister Ever, sent me an Unfancy blog post arguing that all you need to look great every day is a capsule wardrobe of 37 items per season, I scoffed.… Read the full article