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AUDIENCE

What style of language is appropriate for your reader? Does it need to be formal or informal – even chatty? It will certainly need to capture and hold their attention and this means being lively and interesting. The chances are you will need to be quite formal but use a few ‘chatty’ features carefully chosen and used sparingly.

PURPOSE

What style of writing will achieve the aims of your article? Are you writing to persuade, inform or explain?

GENRE

What style and form of writing is needed to satisfy your reader’s ‘genre expectations’, i.e. what ‘genre conventions’ must you follow to satisfy your reader’s ‘genre expectations’? Think what you would expect to see and read in such an article: catchy or witty headlines – maybe a pun or play on words, sub-headings to aid clarity and reading, use of bullet points, lists, images, tables, etc.

CONTEXT

Where is it likely to be read? In what situation? What language choices will help here? Often an article is not read ‘in depth’ and at a time when full concentration is possible. So… a catchy lively style which does not demand too much of your reader and which follows a clear and logical structure is almost certain to be a good choice for many articles.

A SUCCESSFUL ARTICLE...

CAPTURE THE READER ATTENTION:

How can you achieve this? A catchy title or headline? A suitable image or photo?

HOOK YOUR READER INTO THE 'WORLD OF THE ARTICLES':

How can you achieve this? Make the opening sentence intriguing, lively, ‘catchy’? Give the outline facts immediately – answering: What? Who? Where? When?

IS LIVELY AND INTERESTING:

How can you achieve this? A short opening sentence? A mix of shorter and longer sentences? Clear succinct paragraphs that always open with a topic sentence that gives, in a nutshell, what the rest of the paragraph will explore in more depth?

GIVE THE MOST IMPORTANT INFORMATION FIRST:

How can you achieve this? Work out what is most important and interesting and write about this first? Leave the less important aspects and the finer detail till later?

SOUND TRULY AUTHENTICS AND GAIN'S YOUR READER TRUST:

How can you achieve this? Create a 'voice' for your reader that is convincingly sincere – you will achieve this if you write in a natural, lively style.

SOUND AUTHORITIVE, IS ENTIRELY BELIEVABLE...AND IS PERSUASIVE:

How can you achieve this? Write confidently; perhaps include made-up interviews with 'experts'; use 'made up' statistics and evidence for authoritative sources (but keep all this reasonable and believable). Use a mixture of vocabulary including a few more complex words and a few technical terms.

AVOID EXCESSIVE SENTIMENTALITY OR BEING OVERLY EMOTIONAL OR PERSONAL:

You are writing for a wide and unknown audience – you cannot know them and they will not know you. Try, after each sentece, to put on 'your reader's hat' and being sure that what you write would engage and convince you!