How to Seduce Readers Before They Read Your First Sentence

How to Seduce Readers Before They Read Your First Sentence

by Big Idea Company

In the next sixty seconds you'll learn what every

reader craves. More importantly, you'll learn

what turns them off before they even begin

reading.

Imagine you sell shrunken heads. You own a shop that offers the best shrunken heads for prices so low that not even the local Wicca can compete. But instead of an easy-to-find shop, you operate out of a building surrounded by a swamp. Even the loyal shrunken head collectors will take one look and instinctively decide not to enter - too much trouble.

People make the same judgments every time they look at a newspaper, open a magazine or click on a website. It happens in a split second. If the writing looks like too much trouble to read, they move on. No question.

Remember this: readers don't want to work to read. And they shouldn't have to. Reading is supposed to be enjoyable. So the key to seducing readers is to make your text look enjoyable. Here's how.

First, choose a font that's easy to read. Fancy fonts are distracting. Readers don't jump up and down the hallways waving pages in the air, screaming, "Holy cow - you won't believe how great this font is!" In fact, a good font does just the opposite. It works its magic like a calm river, gently moving the reader along until they reach the end of the story and think, "It's over already?"

And when you find your font, stick to it. Don't use one for your headline, another for your body, and another for the captions beneath your photographs. Just use one. It looks nicer.

Unfortunately, the most heavenly font in the world won't mean a thing if the type is too big or too small. Have you ever tried to read a medical journal? Not only do you need a microscope, but also a great deal of patience as you work hard to keep your eyes balanced along each sentence. That's what happens when there's not enough space between your lines.

A small font and tiny line-spacing is a recipe for a big, ugly block of text. That gives readers a headache. And they know it.

Adjusting margins is taboo for the same reason. Squeezing as much text as you can get onto a single page is not equivalent to getting the most bang for your buck. Margins exist for a reason - to avoid big blocks of text! Yes, it's worth repeating. Imagine if these words ran all the way from one side of the page to the other. It'd look like a tire track across a piece of paper. Nobody wants to read that.

Why do you think every successful newspaper and magazine in the country uses multiple columns? It's no coincidence. Splitting an article into short columns breaks up the text by creating more white space.

There it is - the Big Kahuna, the Grand Poobah, the KEY to making your text look irresistible! Readers love white space. It's gentler on their eyes. To them, lots of print means lots of work. So maximize your white space. Use a simple font, an easy-to-read type size, adequate line spacing, normal margins and short columns. These are all designed to make your writing easier for the reader to enjoy.

Did our content seduce you? Want to read more Marketing and PR blog articles? Visit BigIdeaCompany.com.