Copywriting Academy 2: Flow and exit points

Most people instinctively know when they read good writing. It sucks them in. They move from sentence to sentence with such ease that stopping is simply not an option. All of a sudden they're at the end, time has passed and they still want to know more. This is flow.

Sadly, it's just as easy to recognise poor writing. It's stilted. It begins thoughts it never finishes. It meanders, taking a scenic route where nothing is really worth looking at. Poor writing is littered with what I term 'exit points' – these are the points in your copy where your reader could stop reading and it just wouldn't matter.

Achieving flow in your copy

Flow is one of the most difficult things to get right in copywriting. There are few hard and fast rules or tick box exercises that will get you there. You have to feel your way a little. The best way to show what I mean is with an example.

Let's start with some poor copy:

Many companies today want to bring all their communications together in one place. They want to allow employees to get phone calls, email, text messages and instant messages to their desktop. They also want this to be possible when employees move desks, work from home or adopt mobile working. The solution is called unified communications. It turns all forms of communication into data which is sent over an IP network.

Riveting stuff no?

While all the sentences are correct and the facts build and expand, there is no flow. The copy just lumbers along. As a reader I could stop anywhere, every full stop is an exit point. So what to do?

Eliminate duplicates

Firstly look for duplicate words (want and they in the above example stand out) and write around them:

Many companies today are looking to bring all their communications together in one place. They want to allow employees to get phone calls, email, text messages and instant messages to their desktop. These communications must also be available when employees move desks, work from home or adopt mobile working. The solution is called unified communications. It turns all forms of communication into data which is sent over an IP network.

Well, it's a little better but it still suffers from being too stilted, too piecemeal. Each sentence stands pretty much alone.

Cascading ideas

What we need to do is cascade the thought through the paragraph so that each sentence picks up an element of the one before. Like this:

Many companies today are looking to bring all their communications together in one place. In doing so they'll allow employees to get phone calls, email, text and instant messages to their desktop. Of course today that desktop can be anywhere – in the office, at home or on the move. The answer is unified communications. Simply, unified communications, turns all forms of communication into data which is sent over an IP network.

Better.

Of course there are other options. In the example above I took forward the idea of companies changing their communications. I could have picked up the idea of the communications themselves. Like this:

Many companies today are looking to bring all their communications together in one place. Communications that span the entire range of phone calls, email, text and instant messages.

And so on.

Back to base

While the easiest way to achieve flow is by cascading, it is not the only structural option. Another is to set a base thought in the first sentence and return to it in every subsequent sentence in that paragraph. Like this:

Many companies today are looking to bring all their communications together in one place. Communications that span the entire range of phone calls, email, text and instant messages. That, if managed successfully, can revolutionise customer service and boost productivity.

I find the back to base approach a little less elegant. However, if used in moderation, it can lend your copy a more lofty, epic tone.

So there you go, that's flow in a nutshell. While none of the examples will win any prizes, hopefully you get the idea.

As always, you can see all the posts in the copywriting Academy series by following this link.