May 1, 2006

Editorial Guidelines Can Set You Free

Due to its creative nature, writing may seem like one of those activities that should not be strictly regulated.

In reality, editorial guidelines are one of the quickest and easiest ways to improve your writing. Rather than constricting the creative process, guidelines can have the opposite effect. They keep people focused on creating clear, useful writing versus being mired down in overly long, jargon-filled, rambling copy that's meaningless to readers.

How to create useful guidelines

Here are some things to consider when establishing editorial guidelines within your organization:

1. Know your venue. Editorial guidelines should distinguish between web pages, Microsoft® Office PowerPoint® slides and newsletters. Each has a different purpose that speaks to different writing best practices.
   
   
2. Word count is the most important guideline you've got. And it's also the most abused. Most articles published in corporate publications today are twice as long as they need to be (about 500 words for the main cover story and 200-300 words for other articles is considered ideal). And web articles should not require more than one screen scroll to read.
   
   
3. Help writers remember to use clear headlines and subheads to break up copy. Readers should be able to get the gist of your message simply by scanning the copy (that's what most of them are going to do anyway). Clear headlines and subheads will help make key points stand out so key messages are understood even if every word is not read.
   
   
4. Establish good use of sidebars. Sidebars are a very useful, and an often forgotten way of pulling key information out of an article and calling readers' attention to it.