backFamiliarity breeds content, Part 2

In our last blog, we looked at how familiar content is important to readers. In this blog, we look at the power of familiar words.

Abate those fancy words

The 1941 poster illustrating this blog announces 'Noise Abatement Week'. It's a cool poster, but you have to wonder at the wisdom of using a word like 'abatement' in a public campaign designed to get ordinary folk to keep the noise down. Even 'back in the day'. And it's a word that still commonly appears in public sector communications.

If a word is not familiar – well known and easily understood – by its intended audience, it is not going to be helpful.

For example, if we ditched a word like abate and just said ‘reduce’, ‘put an end to’ or ‘lessen’ or just plain ‘stop’, many more people would understand what we meant. This is important if we want them to stop making a racket in the wee small hours of Sunday morning. 

If we pack our writing with jargon, formal terms, fancy words, terms borrowed from law books (in non-legal documents), or familiar words used in an unfamiliar way, we make our readers work too hard, or lose them altogether.

The trick with business writing is for the ideas and concepts to shine, and for the words to be an invisible conveyor belt. 

For a fascinating look at how well a selection of words commonly used in public documents is likely to be understood by your readers, download Martin Cutts’ Plain English Lexicon – a guide to whether your words will be understood.