How Fast Can You Read This?

We’re all skim readers.

We glance through content until something grabs us—like how to make our marketing lives easier.

But even if the topic is relevant, great content must continuously keep our attention.

So why does most marketing feel like reading War and Peace?

And more importantly, how do you stop that from happening?

Ignore your marketing committee

Too many cooks and too many agendas never produce great content.

The solution: Get them to agree on the goal of your marketing asset. Then focus only on the information you need to achieve it.

If they stray, remind them what’s at stake: your marketing results.

Buy a chainsaw

Take it to your finished copy and remove every word that’s not useful.

The ensuing clarity will amaze you.

Go ahead and break it

Line breaks make for faster reading. And they eliminate unappealing gray blocks of copy.

Make it heady stuff

Subheads are loved by skim readers, so make sure they tell your story.

Because when subheads work, your audience will go back and read the in-between parts.

Or better yet, take action.

Bring back the box

While the Johnson Box was originally devised for direct mail letters, variations of it can do wonders across mediums.

How? By putting focus on a headline that makes it crystal clear what you’re offering.

More brevity

Get to the point and drive the action.

Adding content because someone feels it’s important just gets in the way. That content is usually more useful later in the sales cycle.

We're about done

Set expectations and stick to them.