Thursday 4 September 2014

Writing short blog posts

Short is sweet. Well... generally, and more so due to the lack of time we have versus the amount of information available these days. In the digital age, information availability is not as big a problem as the time available for assimilation. I have read several blogs of note and some of them despite being good (in content and writing style) require a lot of effort to read them in one attempt. This could be a transient phase in which I am struggling to manage my time properly. The conclusion I drew from this experience was to write short blog posts.

So how does this work? What if I have more to say? And does the reader really care?
If the reader is involved in your blog and reads regularly, it is highly likely that he/she may read posts even if those are long. But to attract and retain new readers, catch their attention quickly with good content, flow and lucid writing. That's what most adept writers know how to do. But AFAIK, Most such writers write long, engaging novels with attention to detail. An example is The Da Vinci Code.

This seems counter-intuitive. How does one balance being succinct and engaging at the same time? I am no expert in writing and my experience is based on whatever I have read, blog posts, news articles, research papers, reviews, novels, fiction, non fiction books etc. Follow a scientific article like format- short and to-the-point intro to the theme. Add a bit of history and your own unique perspective on the topic. Do not repeat much (some writers don't agree with this and I too break this rule of thumb as per need) content and be as clear and unambiguous as possible. Try to wrap up in few paragraphs, may be four is more then enough.

Lastly, nothing beats good content. More so in the era of short attention spans versus mountains of information. Be short, but valuable. I attempt to better my writing using this format (in short manageable chunks) and hopefully write few things worth reading in that process.

Abbrevaitions:
AFAIK=As far as I know