Who will win the race for clarity?

Who’s the clearest of them all? Which organisation best understands the need for clarity in communication?

It's the ninth year in the life of the Plain English Awards. This year again saw a great bunch of entries with 122 across 12 categories. The list of finalists  is out and the wait is nearly over — we’ll know the winners on 27 November.

Showing their dedication to clarity

The finalist organisations are united by their dedication to clarity in communication. They understand that communicating clearly and simply contributes to their success, and they walk the talk. Clear communication shows they respect and understand their audiences and readers, and it builds goodwill. These organisations also know that clear communication can increase their bottom line.

‘The Awards encourage organisations to show they care about communicating honestly and clearly,’ says Gregory Fortuin, Chair of the WriteMark Plain English Awards Trust. 

‘Making the effort to communicate in plain English can make a difference to the lives of many people.’

Categories in the Awards honour documents and websites — and the people who write them. And members of the public have joined in the push for plain English by nominating good and bad documents in the People’s Choice category.

Making a difference to the bottom line

Clear communication is an important contributor to an organisation’s success. For example, last year’s grand prize winner, the Ministry of Social Development, reduced the number of phonecalls from welfare clients needing to clarify a point from an average 25% to just 2.5%. Fewer phonecalls means money saved, and less pressure on the call centre.

The spokesman for the Environmental Protection Authority said he’d been complimented for their winning entry: ‘…getting fan mail for a government publication is something of a rarity.’

Making business writing better

Our WriteMark assessors like this recent blog from Bryan A. Garner for the Harvard Business Review. He talks about ways to connect with your reader and avoid sending them to sleep.

Read Bryan A. Garner's blogpost

The techniques he mentions are all tried and true fundamentals of plain language. And they match neatly with the language-related criteria of the WriteMark Plain English Standard.

Read about the WriteMark criteria

Writing in plain language helps you connect with your reader and get your message across — first time. Your readers will thank you for it.

Plain language is good business

Candi Harrison offers this guest post. Candi is the former Co-Chair of the US Federal Web Managers Council. She has served as a judge for the WriteMark Plain English Awards and the ClearMark Awards for the past 3 years.

I worked on U.S. Government websites for 10 years; and I learned there’s one principle that trumps all others: if you don’t communicate effectively, you can’t serve effectively. If customers come to your website and cannot understand what you offer and how to get it, they leave and never come back. They tell their friends what a rotten website you have and, by extension, how bad you must be. 

How you communicate – the words you use and the ways you organize them – brands your organization as much as that little logo you use or those razzle dazzle graphics or those expensive ad campaigns. That’s why getting the words right – making them “plain” – is good business.

So how do you get the words right? You get to know your customers – how they think and how they talk.  You train everyone in your organization how to write right, and you reward staff members who improve your products.  You look for examples of good writing and emulate them. You watch your customers use what you’ve written, see where they stumble, and fix it. You find professionals to help you. You invest the time because it makes your product better and your customers happy.

There’s lots of help. The folks at WriteMark in New Zealand and the Center for Plain Language in the US offer great resources. Right now, WriteMark is offering a “free sample” of their services. Just send them a document or web page, and they’ll give you a mini-review. That gives you a place to start. 

Check out the winners of WriteMark’s Plain Writing Awards and the US ClearMark Awards, and use them as examples. Get your staff together to look at the winners. Talk about what works and why. Then see how you can apply those lessons to your own products. 

Businesses, non-profits, and governments all over the world are getting on the plain language band wagon.  Why?  Because it just makes sense. When your customers can find and use what they want, easily and effectively, they’re happy. Happy customers come back. They tell their friends. Plain language is good business.

Check out the WriteMark and the offer of a sample assessment

See the WriteMark Award winners

See the ClearMark Award winners

Find out more about the Center for Plain Language

Put your communications to the test

We love it when people discover the benefits of plain language! Better later than never, we say. In a recent blogpost, Simon Dudley of Logitech talks about connecting with your customers using plain language. No need for 'fluffy, marketing jargon,' he says. Simon has just discovered the Center for Plain Language, and it seems he's a convert!

He suggests taking a look at the Center's website, then taking a closer look 'to see if your company meets their standards'.

Read Simon's blogpost about plain language

Not to be outdone, in New Zealand, Write Limited has been making a noise about plain language for almost 25 years.

Read what Lynda Harris says about the business benefits of plain English