Convince reviewers to abandon jargon

Richard Teerlink, chairman of Harley-Davidson, stands in front of a screen showing a bicep emblazoned with his company’s logo.

Start making sense — **What’s wrong with this picture?** We don’t call them tattoos any more. Now they’re “dermatological graphics.” *Image by Stlukesguild1*

“We don’t call them tattoos any more,” he told his audience. Instead, he said, they are now “dermatological graphics.”

Of course you don’t, Mr. Teerlink.

Just like we don’t call it a company, talking, hiring consultants or coming up with ideas any more. Now they’re the enterprise, interfacing, utilizing change agents and ideation.

Jargon. Buzzwords. Acronyms. They’re things that make your reader go “huh?” And we need to get them out of our copy.

But you know that.

For many communicators, the biggest obstacle to writing clearly isn’t that they don’t know how to get the gobbledygook out. It’s that their approvers love the gobbledygook.

So here’s a list of reasons to avoid jargon. Use it to convince your most incomprehensible colleagues that jargon not only hinders communication, it also hurts business.

Jargon:

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Cut Through the Clutter

Make every piece you write easier to read & understand

Is your copy easy to read? According to communication experts, that’s one of the two key questions people ask to determine whether to read a piece — or toss it.

**Slice through your message** To reach readers, cut through the jargon, buzzwords and gobbledygook. *Image by Deanna Wardin*

Fortunately, academics have tested and quantified what makes copy easy to read. Unfortunately, that research virtually never makes it out of the ivory tower and into the hands of writers who could actually apply it.

But you’ll leave Catch Your Readers — a two-day writing Master Class on Nov. 2-3 in Houston — with “the numbers” you need to measurably improve your copy’s readability. Specifically, you’ll learn:

How long is too long: For your paragraphs? Your sentences? Your words?
Three ways to shorten your copy — and which is the most effective way
How to avoid causing your reader to skip your paragraphs
A tool you can use (you already have it, but you might not know it) to quantifiably improve your copy’s readability
A seven-step system for making your copy clearer and more concise

This is your last chance to learn to Catch Your Readers in 2016. Don’t miss out! Register now.