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As mum to a 2 year old certifiable bookworm, I am working my way through an impressive quantity of children's books. His favourite place to read is on my lap while in the beanbag in his room which I am getting increasingly incapable of getting out of - thus rendering me a captive audience for whatever selection he has flung at me from the bookcase.
He will occasionally become temporarily obsessed with an utter clanger of a book which I will then try to hide on-top of the cabinet when he's not looking. On the whole though his taste in books is pretty sound (Julia Donaldson, Axel Scheffler, Nick Sharatt, Ian Whybrow, and of course the classic "That's Not My....." series).
We recently snuggled (collapsed) into our beanbag to read The Storm Whale - the perfect sort of book that has the power to captivate a toddler even in the mad hour before bed. I'll feel his body still and his breathing slow as he listens to every word and marvels at the beautiful illustrations containing the perfect amount of intrigue and detail. The whole book contains the grand total of 54 words but each one has been carefully selected to provide a beautiful reading rhythm, to be understood by a very young child, and to help take us on a journey into the story. A good children's writer really is a true magician!
It dawned on me that as marketers and writers, we could learn a lot from children's books ensuring that every word we use has a purpose. Does our reader understand the words we've chosen, do those words convey what we're trying to explain? Is the story captivating enough to engage the reader but short enough to keep their interest? If we're writing headlines then how does each word work together lyrically and visually. Are our blogs as pithy as they can be? Have we got captivating visuals to draw our reader in?
Is this blog as concise and meaningful as it could be? I'll leave that one for you to judge.
Do you want some help keeping your business writing concise? Get in touch.
