As a child, were you also taken with stories that were embellished in detail? Long and extended explanations with many details and colorful decorations?
But do you also remember for what purpose these stories were told to you?Exactly! At the end of those stories, you were probably already in a deep sleep that lasted until morning.
And today, grown up and reflected, we know why!
Lengthy, detailed, and extended stories are soporific.
No wonder we fell asleep peacefully after three sets that felt like they were thirty minutes long.
Today we know better!
What is the ACTUAL situation?
Your customers see your advertising, whether in moving image like an explainer video or text form.
In order not to lose the customer’s attention, the content must be formulated briefly and succinctly.
Get to the point – and not just after umpteen sentences and words.
Here are the most important tips on how to create short and crisp texts and what to look out for:
FILLWORDS
Avoid filler words, such as “actually, among other things, especially, etc.”
If you actively pay attention to pushing filler words aside, your text will already take a crisp direction.
FLOSKELN
Avoid empty phrases. Headlines and 08/15 attention grabbers that you’ve seen a hundred times before are off-putting and bore your customers.
REVIEW
When you have finished your text, have someone who is not familiar with the subject matter read it through.
Here you can see whether the text is written simply and understandably, whether it is understood.
PHRASES
No nesting – explain in a clear and concise way. If it occurs to you during the sentence that you can fill it with yet another subject by complicated nesting, you’d better not do that, as you can also see from this very sentence.
Rather, formulate two or three short sentences, instead of one long one.
ACTIVE
Active can be understood in two ways:
1. pay grammatical attention to active spelling.
2. actively ask your customer to follow something. This is, for example, the registration in a newsletter and the invitation to purchase. Explain clearly what you want.
OPTIK
If the text is too long, the customer skips it.
A short visual impression is enough for your customer to decide whether to read the text or not.
EXPLAIN tO THE POINT
Get to the point.
What do you want to say and what is the fastest way to get there?
No filler words, no paraphrases, no extended digressions, no long speech – explain what you want to say!
STRUCTURE
Despite brevity, you need to bring a guideline and structure to your text.
Pay attention to paragraphs, sections, and subheadings.
FONT SIZE
It’s hard to believe, but font sizes also matter.
Who is your target audience and which fonts suit you, your product and company?
ONLINE & RESPONSIVE
Remember that most of your copy will be read online. On the screen or on various smart devices. Check the readability of your texts on all devices before you put your works online. Explan smarter not harder.
The eye “eats” with you!
CROSS READERS
Design your text in such a way that cross readers also take something away with them.
No text is short enough for cross-readers. That’s why you also read short and crisp texts crosswise.
STRUCTURE
There are fixed structure proposals to be followed.
They need to see if a structure will work out for them. And if so, which ones and how you apply them. Every company, every product and every service is individual and must be served differently in terms of text.
Short and crisp – this applies to texts as well as moving image formats.
Would you like to present your company, your service and your product in a short explainer video?
Again, the above rules are the nuts and bolts of captivating the viewer.
You are not yet completely convinced? Take a look at the following successful explainer video examples.
