How Does This Grab You?

If you want your insight messages to have real impact, you need to grab your reader’s attention from the start. Before you even begin to write, think carefully - what is the most important message that you need to get across? Use a powerful headline to attract attention, so that the recipient wants to read on. Then start with your key message, summarising it succinctly in your first sentence if at all possible. You can then expand upon it.

 

This principle applies whether you are writing an email or a summary report. Just think:  

Use those first few minutes or seconds to get your message across. If the recipient then wants to read on for the full details, that’s great, but if they don’t, they should at least have grasped the gist of what you wanted to say. Choose an informal, catchy style for your item: one that is closer to that of the Daily Mail or Express, rather than the stiffer approach of The Guardian or The Times.

 

At school you may have been taught to write formally, in the third person, using complicated words and long sentences. This really doesn’t work in business today! People are pressed for time, so you need to make sure that anything you send to them is punchy, clear and to the point. Swallow your pride and ‘think tabloid’ – and you’ll be more effective at getting your insight messages across.

 

Helen James of Insight Partners is an expert in this type of writing, which is why she is one of our chosen course leaders. The next open course in London is on Thursday 3^rd April. Helen also runs training for in-house teams (see our website for more information). As one recent delegate to a writing course reported: “It’s so simple, it makes you wonder why you haven’t always been doing it!”

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