It was like a punch to the gut:
“Maybe people are skimming your copy because it’s boring and predictable.” *
Modern marketers are taught to write copy that’s easy to skim with
- ✅ visual hierarchy
- ✅ grade-school vocabulary (absolutely!)
- ✅ simplified concepts
All good things.
But in truth, the goal isn’t for our audiences to skim our content.
Let’s write interesting, engaging content that also follows the rules above. Let’s craft long-sentences and short ones so the tempo isn’t monotonous. Let’s consider each sentence as an advertisement, enticing the reader to read on. Let’s edit cut out the boring parts.
You will never stop people from skimming your content. But you can stop writing content that’s intentionally skimmable.
*Credit where credit is due: I wish I had written down the author’s name so I could have tagged them in this post. Thanks for the inspiration, anonymous marketing fairy godmother!