My aim is to put down on paper what I see and what I feel in the best and simplest way.
Ernest Hemingway.
The secret to writing clearly is knowing who your audience is, knowing what they want and what information they already know.
Focusing on Your Reader
Once you know what your message is, the next step is to write for your audience.
You need to write to your audience the same way you would write to your best friend. If you were writing a letter to someone you'd grown up with you would know what to say and what not to say. The same principle applies when you start writing for your reader's.
Knowing Your Audience
Once you know who your audience is you can begin to structure your work, use the right kind of language, include the right kind of information and also how to approach each topic.
Everyone has shorter attention spans these days so you should aim to get your point across fairly quickly, and be able to include as many important points within your first few paragraphs.
Establish a Writing Persona
Audience personas are used by marketing agencies and businesses to help them market their products to consumers. You can use a persona in writing by building a fictional profile of the reader you want to target. Once you've written a simple reader persona you'll be able to understand your audience's wants and desires, and be able to find out what they need.
Important note: You can build your writing persona by gathering information from social media, and website analytics. Using your metrics and social media you should be able to discover what age group most of your audience is, as well as their values and goals.
Form a Connection With Your Audience
You've established who your readers are now you need to figure out what it is they're looking for. You do this by using your new persona on social media and through your blog posts, this is the key to understanding how to relate to your reader.
Discovering Your Reader's Daily Frustrations and Challenges
When you know what your audience is struggling with you can provide a solution to their problem. Connecting with them by asking questions and asking what they want to read from you. This will help you build a connection with your reader's.
Be Useful to Your Reader
Create useful content so your audience will know where to turn when they're looking for useful information. People will always come back if they know the quality is good and is authentic. Make your content easy-to-read and easy to scan over when necessary, because a lot of people read information on the go today.
People like to hear real stories, see real photos, and be encouraged by a real human being. There's no harm in showing those things to your reader's. Let them get to know who you are, what you like doing in your spare time and what really interests you.
Learn How to Captivate Your Readers With Your Words
One of the hardest things to do in writing is to keep an audience engaged.
You should be able to grab your audience's attention within the first few sentences or paragraphs, and then keep them captivated with your prose.
Keep your audience engaged using metaphors, similes and imagery this will keep them engrossed right up to the last paragraph.
Be Highly Knowledgeable in Your Particular Field
Many of your readers will already know a certain amount of information on your topic. It will become obvious to your audience pretty quickly that you don't know what you're talking about.
If the information isn't yours, always cite the source, this will keep you right and will also show your honesty.
Always Check Your Work for Mistakes
Being accurate is really important and simple grammar mistakes can hurt your credibility. Remember Google filters out "poor-quality content".
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Read more:
15 Ideas to Make Your Writing More Clear
14 Ideas to Stay Focused When You Write
How to Improve Your Skills as a Non-Fiction Writer
12 Glaring Signs You're a Writer at Heart
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