Always felt weird about the style of blogs I write, so the reassurance that you can chill out is refreshing. Do you have any tips on creating/thinking about the list of things your reader might know // how you’d determine who your reader is likely to be?
Do you have any tips on creating/thinking about the list of things your reader might know // how you’d determine who your reader is likely to be?
I personally imagine writing for my past self, before I started learning about a topic. I know other bloggers think of one of their friends and base it on conversations they’ve had with the friend.
I also find it helpful to write out an explicit list of things the target reader would know and what they don’t know. You don’t have to capture every single term you use in your article but setting the baseline like that helps you make decisions about other terms. Like, “I’m assuming the reader has never heard of git, but I tell them to use dig, so I should probably explain dig.”
I think writing out a list is also a good opportunity to check whether you’re writing for a sensible target audience. I’ve worked with a lot of bloggers who are like, “This post is for web developers with 2-3 years of experience,” and so I ask how much would have to change for it to be accessible to beginner developers, and they’re usually like, “Oh, huh. I’d only have to add two sentences to explain two terms.” So, I think deciding which terms you assume the reader knows can be an iterative process as you decide what kind of article you want to write and what kind of reader you hope it benefits.
Always felt weird about the style of blogs I write, so the reassurance that you can chill out is refreshing. Do you have any tips on creating/thinking about the list of things your reader might know // how you’d determine who your reader is likely to be?
score 2 · canonical
Thanks for reading!
I personally imagine writing for my past self, before I started learning about a topic. I know other bloggers think of one of their friends and base it on conversations they’ve had with the friend.
I also find it helpful to write out an explicit list of things the target reader would know and what they don’t know. You don’t have to capture every single term you use in your article but setting the baseline like that helps you make decisions about other terms. Like, “I’m assuming the reader has never heard of git, but I tell them to use dig, so I should probably explain dig.”
I think writing out a list is also a good opportunity to check whether you’re writing for a sensible target audience. I’ve worked with a lot of bloggers who are like, “This post is for web developers with 2-3 years of experience,” and so I ask how much would have to change for it to be accessible to beginner developers, and they’re usually like, “Oh, huh. I’d only have to add two sentences to explain two terms.” So, I think deciding which terms you assume the reader knows can be an iterative process as you decide what kind of article you want to write and what kind of reader you hope it benefits.
score 5 · canonical