What are you trying to say? How to Be Clear in Corporate Copy Writing

By Ted Page, Captains of Industry
Look at most corporate websites and you’ll see a common problem – the companies rarely say who they are or what they do in a way that’s concise and easy to understand. (i.e. Does anyone know what this means? “We help businesses to build for change with a new kind of software that lets business users directly capture their business goals — and then dynamically executes new solutions by eliminating software coding and automating manual work.”) As writers, we get so caught up with the fact that we are writing a “corporate” website that our language becomes formal, dull and verbose. We forget we’re talking to people who don’t have the time or inclination to decipher our corporate code-speak. Here’s a simple solution for clear writing that I learned when I was helping my daughter, Abigail, with her High School writing assignments. Abigail would get all tied up in knots trying to writer her all-important opening paragraph for her essay on, say, Ghengis Kahn. She’d read the paragraph to me, and it was typically a tortured, tangled mess. She was practically in tears. I’d put my hand on her shoulder and calmly ask, “What are you trying to say?” The next sentence she blurted out was invariably concise and to the point: “What I’m trying to say is that Ghengis Kahn was a ruthless but brilliant military strategist!” I’d say, “Good, Abigail. Write that down.” Try this the next time you’re writing a website, brochure or annual report. It really works. Just ask Abigail.