How to lead your reader straight to the point

When my husband and I first started dating many years ago, he’d say things to me like:

‘Let’s meet at that café north of Oxford Street.’

or

‘It’s on the southwest corner of the square.’

I’d stare at him like he had two heads.

He soon realised that I have zero sense of direction.

None. Zip. Zilch.

I get disoriented in large houses and supermarkets.

(Don’t laugh. Apparently it’s a real thing called ‘Developmental Topographical Disorientation’. Honest.)

Suffice to say, compass points are useless to me.

So these days he guides me with directions like:

‘It’s opposite the big H&M store’

or

‘Keep going past that weird blue house with the orange windows.’

Because those are the directions that actually mean something to me.

When you communicate, it’s important that you give the right kind of directions too.

Especially when you’re talking or writing about something complicated, you need to guide people towards the most important information, fast (before they nod off).

An easy way to do this is with headings and prompts.

But like my husband’s compass points, often the headings we use don’t connect with our audience.

So we might use:

• Background

• Process

• Requirements

Kind of useful if your audience knows about the topic already. But if they don’t know, or don’t care? Well, then better directions might be:

• What’s new?

• Why it matters

• What’s next?

Or:

• The old way

• The new way

• What you need to do now

Or:

• The big picture

• The detail if you need it

• What this means for you

These types of directions work better because they come from the audience’s perspective, not the author/presenter’s.

Always important if you want to get them to your destination safely.

(And they work even on the ‘topographically challenged’ like me!)