Would you like to have a stronger voice, just like your favourite writers?
Finding your voice is perhaps one of the most frustrating challenges as eLearning writers.
A strong voice helps us stand out in a sea of same-same writing, and it helps us bond with our learners, enticing them to come back to “hear” our voice again.
But how?
Decide who you’re writing for when you write a personal letter or email, do you think of the person you’re writing to?
Perhaps you ask how they are, what their plans are for the weekend, and you might tell them off or make a joke about something that happened the other week. Your writing feels human and real.
When writing for learning, do you also think of the learner who is reading your text? Or do you forget who’s trying to learn from you?
Finding your voice starts with knowing who you are writing for. For instance, you can imagine the kind of person this advertiser is writing for when you read their product description for bacon jerky.
Example of a strong voice:
Ready to have your mind blown? What if we told you bacon doesn’t have to be just a staple at breakfast time and on your sandwich?
Bacon can be a portable, dangerous, habit forming companion at your fingertips, 24/7.
You might start hoarding and stashing. You might tape packs of Bacon Jerky below the conference room table, sew pockets into the inner lining of your long johns, and fill the side pockets of your car with bacon jerky in case you ever break down.
I pictured a macho bacon lover who seeks the thrills of danger. After all the text suggests that bacon can be a portable, dangerously habit forming companion.
Another Example of a strong voice:
I was browsing in a Paris antique shop one winter afternoon when a fitted leather train case caught my eye.
It contained silver handled brushes, boot hooks, a straight razor, several silver-stoppered glass bottles. One bottle was different, encased in wood, with a hand-written date: 1903.
Inside the bottle, there was still the faint aroma of a gentleman’s cologne, Custom-made for a rich traveller a century ago.
(….)
Women like the way it smells on a man. Like a symphony that begins loudly, then soon slides into subtle, entangling developments that grow on them.
Or so I’ve been told.
Who do you think that text resonates with most? Who do you imagine will buy that travelling kit?
The difference in writing voice between Example two and Example one’s copy lies in the words chosen and the imagery sketched:
Example one writes about having your mind blown and filling the side pockets of your car with bacon jerky.
Example two writes about the faint aroma of a gentleman’s cologne and the symphony that begins loudly then slides into subtle, entangling developments.
Different words. Different imagery.
That difference isn’t a creative trick. That difference exists because their writers know who they’re writing for.
Tip:
We’ve all listened to speakers with a weak voice. They ramble on.
They speak in generic terms. They use meaningless words. Their messages remain wishy-washy, and their ideas are buried under wordy sludge.
A strong voice starts with clarity of thought. When you know what you want to communicate, you can present your ideas clearly. Without frills. Without babbling.