The most important parts first?
The traditional narrative style with a beginning, middle and end?
What’s the best way to structure your writing?
Let me answer these questions with a few more…
What are you writing? Who are you writing for? What are they expecting?…
As always, it’s best to keep in mind what your trying to do, and who you’re trying to do it for.
There’s simply no set formula, no surefire structure that can used for all cases…
WHAT IS THE INVERTED PYRAMID?
The inverted pyramid is a writing structure that has its origins in journalism.
It gives the most important details first, and the less important information follows.
A piece of writing that follows the inverted pyramid shape will give the who, what, where, when and why of a story immediately, followed by the details of the event , followed by the context and background information.
It arose from technological and format limitations in the days of stories being sent by telegraph and printed in newspapers. Rather than telling a story, the most important information would be sent or written first, in case technological failure or space limitation meant the end of the story had to be omitted.
WHY IS THE INVERTED PYRAMID SUITED TO THE WEB?
ATTENTION
On the web, time is critical. You have maybe just a few seconds to capture the readers’ attention.
You need to draw the reader in, differentiate yourself from others, and show the value you can offer the reader, all as soon as they arrive on the page.
It’s no use crafting a brilliant story with magnificent setup and resolution in the 5th paragraph if the reader has read the title and first sentence… and then left.
When readers arrive on a page, they look for clues that reading the rest of the article is going to be worth their while.
KEYWORDS
If the user has arrived at your page via a search engine, they have found you using certain ‘keywords’.
If those keywords aren’t reflected in your text, readers quickly assume your page isn’t relevant to them.
Indeed, if the keywords aren’t reflected in your text, it will be much more difficult that you’ll appear in search engines at all…
SKIMMING AND SCANNING
The internet is different from other forms of media.
Readers don’t actually ‘read’.
They skim.
It’s why article on the internet are made of short paragraphs, with bold text to highlight key phrases.
Large chucks of text get skimmed over.
Its headings and the upper left of paragraphs that get more attention.
DRAWBACKS OF THE INVERTED PYRAMID
As with most aspects of marketing, there’s no one size fits all answer.
When starting to write, its important to keep in mind, what type of text are you writing? Who’s going to read it? What stage of the customer journey are they in? How much do they already know about you or the product?…etc
The inverted pyramid is very effective at providing information or news.
But not as effective at touching the human heart…
LACK OF SHARED HUMAN EMOTION
What if what your reader needs isn’t so much information but rather an experience? an uplifting tale of someone like them overcoming the odds?
Sometimes the reader needs more than the cold, hard facts to be persuaded.
With a build up through a beginning, middle and end.
A story is better at creating an emotional connection with the reader than the more informative style of the inverted pyramid.
IT ALL DEPENDS ON YOUR BUYER PERSONA
Who are you writing for and what do they want?
Are they a highly qualified, highly knowledgable buyers that arrive on your product page?
Are they looking to connect with the values of your company and see what makes you different via a story on your ‘about us’ page?
Have you been stringing your reader along, slowly building up to a crescendo with a series of stories via drip emails?
Do you have relatively uninformed customers or a novel product that is best explained by a short story or analogy on your home page?
Maybe what you need is in fact a combination the inverted pyramid and narrative? Where you hook your users with a heading and quickly show the value you can provide at the beginning before taking them on a ride and telling your incomparable story?
The structure that best suits your needs depends on the same thing all marketing depends on: understand your objectives and understanding your customers needs, wants, desires, and fears.
