Knowing Your Audience
Knowing who you’re writing to plays a big part in both WHAT you write and in HOW you write it. The first of our Four Cardinal Questions asks, “What do I want my audience to know?” Well, if you don’t know your audience, you’re going to have a hard time creating a clear answer for that question!
Defining audience
At its core, your audience is anyone who happens to read your writing. Most of us have an ideal audience, though, meaning we have a target who reads our writing more than any other group. It’s important, then, to decide who it is you’re writing to the most. Are they your colleagues? Your peers? Your clients or potential clients? Your friends? Partners or possible partners?
Audiences with multiple identity
These categories can overlap, too. In our audience, we have writing professionals, solo-preneurs, bloggers, coaches, and a variety of other professions. Many of you are our peers as well as our clients; some of you we know better than others. How do we decide, then, who our audience is? Our writing aims at what all these people have in common: They recognize that writing well is critical to their tasks.
Speaking to audiences
First, you must decide on your audience for every piece that you write. From there, you can decide the appropriate way to proceed. If you′re writing a blog, you might be able to approach your audience in a more conversational way than you would if you were writing a proposal. A document intended for people in a specific field enjoys more of an inside-angle than an informational essay.
Examining perspective
Decide if you can take the first-person, I/we perspective with your writing, as we often do. The first-person tone is decidedly informal, and it can create a sense of ease between audience and author. You can use contractions more readily with an informal tone such as this, and your word choice can be a bit more conversational. First person works well in blogs, ezines, newsletters, and the like.
Most people learn to write using the third-person, author-is-absent perspective. There’s nothing at all wrong with this point of view, and, in fact, it’s more appropriate for more formal business communications. While you′ll want to avoid contractions and formalize your vocabulary, don′t fall into the common trap of thinking that third person needs to be stuffy and academic in tone. Keep your word choice simple and clear.
Knowing who your audience is and how to address them will help you construct your thoughts in the most effective manner. Try out different ways of writing, too, to see if you can reach a different audience while making the same point.
Aaron Nielsenshultz, Writing Guru for Red Pepper Writing ( redpepperwriting.com redpepperwriting.com), teaches ambitious coaches, consultants, and other solopreneurs how to use the power of writing to get more clients and make more sales. For F*REE weekly tips, sign up for our ezine here: redpepperwriting.com/ezine.htm redpepperwriting.com/ezine.htm .