Strengthen Your Writing Skills

The best articles from the ‘Unleash Your Voice’ competition will end up in our printed magazine which has 55,000 readers. To help you get to the top spot, we’ve listed Twelve Top Tips from our Xplode journalists below.

1. Cut out as many words as possible e.g the word ‘that’ is rarely needed. e.g. Danielle discovered (that) she was pregnant.
2. Never use a long one where a short one will do. e.g. We prefer ‘about’ to ‘approximately’, ‘but’ to ‘however’.
3. Avoid clichés at all costs
4. Never use the passive where you can use the active. e.g. the dog bit the man rather than the man was bitten by the dog

5. Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word, or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent.
6. Make sure all important information is first. People tend to read website pages in an F-shaped pattern.
7. KISS – Keep it short and sweet! Stick to less than 350 words for the web.
8. Short paragraphs are good, long paragraphs are bad. One sentence paragraphs are fine for the web. Bullet points, lists and subheadings are a great way to break up your web content.
9. Use contractions – forget what your English teacher told you about saying ‘it is’ instead of ‘it’s’. Contract things!
10. Vary your sentence lengths. Short sentences are the best. But mix it up. A mix of long and short sentences will keep your writing pact and interesting.
11. And you can start sentences with conjunctions! It’s okay, you’re allowed. Beginning a sentence with ‘and, but or so’ are great ways of keeping the writing flowing and it can also make a sentence stand out… Give it a go!
12. Keep it real. Use descriptive words that people can relate to – watch these make your writing come to life.