The main thing I try to do is write as clearly as I can. I rewrite a good deal to make it clear.
E.B. White.
Feedback, and What It Does
When you sit down and look at what you've written you put yourself into the reader's shoes hoping that your message is clear.
Getting feedback from someone else is a useful way of getting into your reader's head, and understanding how your audience will view your work.
Helen Bolam is a writer, author and podcaster. Offering advice to writers to cure their writing pains.
Clean up your writing and see your ideas take shape.
Start By Pouring Out Your Ideas on the Page
Helen Bolam is a writer, author and podcaster. Offering advice to writers to cure their writing pains.
How to "just write" when you see nothing but a blank page.
There’s no such thing as writer’s block. As long as your fingers can move over the keyboard, eventually it’ll segue into something.
Mary Kay Andrews.
Helen Bolam is a writer, author and podcaster. Offering advice to writers to cure their writing pains.
Why Appearance is Everything
Make it simple. Make it memorable. Make it inviting to look at. Make it fun to read.
Leo Burnett.
Design is one of the most important components of creating any kind of content today.
Helen Bolam is a writer, author and podcaster. Offering advice to writers to cure their writing pains.
Creating a simple convenient experience for the user.
UX Writing, What Is It?
UX writing is the creation of text specifically made to guide the user and give them a better experience.
Good examples of UX writing would be found in:
Helen Bolam is a writer, author and podcaster. Offering advice to writers to cure their writing pains.
Helping the audience to remember what you've written.
What Is It That Makes a Message Truly Noteworthy?
It's funny what you remember and what you don't.
But what is it that makes you really remember things, things you can recall from memory?
The valuable nuggets that you've collected over the years, that have stayed locked inside of your mind. Things like advice, information and language you can recall off the top of your head in an instant.
Psychologists use the acronym SCORE:
How to Make it Stick
Make It Concrete
According to Chip and Dan Heath authors of Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die.
Concrete language helps people, especially novices, understand new concepts. Abstraction is the luxury of experts.
Helen Bolam is a writer, author and podcaster. Offering advice to writers to cure their writing pains.
The only way to learn is by changing your mind.
Orson Scott Card.
Here's a quick thought.
When was the last time you changed someone else's mind?
When did you have a conversation with someone, and come back a few days or weeks later, and that same person was still on the same page as you?
Helen Bolam is a writer, author and podcaster. Offering advice to writers to cure their writing pains.
Alfred Adler.
Essentially empathy means putting yourself in someone else's shoes and understanding how it feels to be there.
There are two sides to empathy:
Emotional Empathy
This is to do with your own emotional sensibilities that enable you to have an understanding of how your fellow man feels in situtations throughout life.
Helen Bolam is a writer, author and podcaster. Offering advice to writers to cure their writing pains.
Every writing project you start you decide on the kind of style you're going to use that will get your message across in the best way.
Helen Bolam is a writer, author and podcaster. Offering advice to writers to cure their writing pains.
This is where a knowledge base becomes an online resource for people looking for simple solutions to their problems.
Helen Bolam is a writer, author and podcaster. Offering advice to writers to cure their writing pains.
Metaphor Meaning
A metaphor is a figure of speech that describes an object or action in a way that isn't literally true, but helps explain an idea or make a comparison. Grammarly.com.
Most often used in poetry and literature when someone needs to make their writing a bit more colourful.
Here are some everyday examples:
Helen Bolam is a writer, author and podcaster. Offering advice to writers to cure their writing pains.
Knowing where the trap is-- that's the first step in evading it.
Frank Herbert.
Let's take a look at 7 writing snares, and discover what we can do to get out of them.
1. Using Jargon
A technical terminology unique to a particular subject. Wordhippo
Specific industries and professions such as the medical or legal will use their own language. To a wider audience this kind of language sounds like nothing more than gobbledegook.
If you want to reach a wider audience you really need to give an explanation of what certain words mean if they're not that familiar with your audience.
Whatever you're writing you always want to make your message as clear as possible to the reader. Don't confuse your audience with terms, acronyms and jargon they won't understand.
Helen Bolam is a writer, author and podcaster. Offering advice to writers to cure their writing pains.
Ernest Hemingway.
From a very young age, we've all been taught to write in a formal manner. In the age of technology and social media this form of writing has become outdated and out of fashion.
Writing formally means that you're less likely to sound like yourself and more likely to sound like a robot.
Helen Bolam is a writer, author and podcaster. Offering advice to writers to cure their writing pains.
The Point of a Paragraph
When a paragraph is written well it's like stepping stones for the reader, gently guiding them through thoughts and new ideas.
Each point is there to help the reader focus on a new idea and thought that the writer has. Creating a simple rhythm through each breath the reader takes reading the text. Helping them to focus and concentrate.
Helen Bolam is a writer, author and podcaster. Offering advice to writers to cure their writing pains.
If you bring that sentence in for a fitting, I can have it shortened by Wednesday.
Hawkeye, a character in M.A.S.H.
Sentences, the Building Blocks of Clear Writing
That's right, each sentence makes up a paragraph, which creates an idea in the reader's mind.
Sentences show your reader's insight into a subject they may never have read before. This is done through your own clear thoughts and ideas put into words.
If what you're thinking isn't that clear it's probably because your mind is clouded over and full of too many things you want to say.
If you're having problems putting your thoughts down on paper take a look at some of your favourite writers and see how they manage to articulate their thoughts.
Helen Bolam is a writer, author and podcaster. Offering advice to writers to cure their writing pains.
The chief virtue that language can have is clearness, and nothing detracts from it so much as the use of unfamiliar words.
Hippocrates.
Plain language is the key to communicating with your audience.
Once you master plain language you'll be able to connect to an audience that would have previously been unattainable.
We're going to look at why writing in plain language is so important, and show you some simple tips and techniques to get you started.
Why Writing in Plain Language Really Important
The shorter and the plainer the better.
Beatrix Potter.
The simpler and plainer the language the more valuable it is for the reader. Everything we've looked at so far about writing clearly this is at the core. The plainer you write the more clear you become, allowing your reader to act on the words you've written down.
Even the most sophisticated of mind's prefers a plainly written text than something more elaborate and complicated.
Helen Bolam is a writer, author and podcaster. Offering advice to writers to cure their writing pains.
A great title is there to engage and inform an audience.
Titles Can Achieve Many Things
The role of a really great title can:
Simply put the title explains an idea, sets the tone, and gives the reader something useful.
All three things are taken into consideration before the audience starts reading.
So with that in mind let's take a look at the different kinds of titles you can use in your writing.
Explanatory
An explanatory title just describes what you're writing about.
Example:
Writing for Beginners
Often not always the best choice because they don't sound that exciting, but the format is really straightforward and always a favourite for writers.
Helen Bolam is a writer, author and podcaster. Offering advice to writers to cure their writing pains.
Provide your writing with structure and cohesion to enable your audience to understand your message.
Why Using a Structure is Essential
The structure you use will gently lead your reader through all of the relevant points you've written, while educating them on the current information they need to know.
With a well thought out structure the groundwork is already laid out making the information more consumable, and all of this is done before they start reading.
Information can be demonstrated by using:
When you start writing you may find that you have to accommodate your point around your structure in order to get your message across. Structures should be seen as more of a writing tool than a model that needs to be adhered to rigidly.
1. Inverted Pyramid
This form is more commonly used in journalism where the most important information is showcased first. Which is to say the who, what, when, where and why of the story swiftly accompanied by supporting details and background information.
Here's an example of how the inverted pyramid can look:
Top
The Lead
The most important information. (Who? What? When? Where? How).
The Body
The crucial information. (Evidence, background, details, logic).
The Tail
Extra information. (Interesting or related items).
Bottom
The inverted pyramid structure is a popular style of writing that is well-suited to all types of readers. Even those impatient readers that only want to read one paragraph.
Helen Bolam is a writer, author and podcaster. Offering advice to writers to cure their writing pains.
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Keeping the reader's attention by writing just enough is one of the hardest parts about writing.
How Much is Enough When You Write?
To get the right word in the right place is a rare achievement. To condense the diffused light of a page of thought into the luminous flash of a single sentence, is worthy to rank as a prize composition just by itself…Anybody can have ideas–the difficulty is to express them without squandering a quire of paper on an idea that ought to be reduced to one glittering paragraph.
Mark Twain.
Every writing project is going to be different to the one before.
Here are some questions to think about when you start a writing project:
Helen Bolam is a writer, author and podcaster. Offering advice to writers to cure their writing pains.
Bring weight to your writing and increase your knowledge by accumulating information.
Investigate
Writer's have varying degrees of knowledge on different subjects, and nobody knows everything, which is why research is such an important part of writing any book or article.
Here are some things you need to think about:
The best approach would be to start looking at books and websites. Then start thinking about people that you know in the field or people you can interview or send questionnaires to.
Let's take a look at some useful research tips:
Helen Bolam is a writer, author and podcaster. Offering advice to writers to cure their writing pains.
