Interpretation tips

Here are a few tips to producing interpretive copy which will engage, inform and enrich your visitors.

• Employ a professional, if you can.
  If it’s possible to hire a professional, you absolutely should. These people know how to do their job, and the job is a very important one. There’s a certain art involved in producing good interpretive copywriting, along with a large measure of skill and a generous dollop of experience. However, a decent level of interpretive copywriting can be achieved by following these simple guidelines:

• Proofreading is the last thing you want to do.
  If your copy is spelled badly, has bad grammar, is clunky, shonky or makes no sense when you read it, you’ll lose the respect and the attention of your visitors. So, before you publish, read it. Then read it again. Use your computer’s spell-check. Read it out loud. Print it out and read it. Ask a friend to read it. Read it in MS Word and then read it again when it is flowed into the draft artwork before publication. Maybe then you’ll pick up on that typo that will otherwise be bugging you for the next ten years.

   

• Use as few words as possible.
  There’s an old story about a son who wrote his mother a letter, which began ‘Mother – I’m sorry to send you such a long letter. I didn’t have time to write a short one.’ With non-fiction writing, length is a great barometer of quality. Say what you need to say clearly and concisely, and use as few words as possible.

   

• Keep sentences short.
  Sentences that ramble on will soon lose the uncommitted reader. Long sentences are boring and, like this sentence, where lots of punctuation forces people to think about how they’re processing the information, they become clumsy, tripping up the reader and causing frustration, and (if you’re not careful), they’ll just go elsewhere for their entertainment. Nobody wants that.

   

• Don’t repeat anything. I repeat; don’t repeat anything.
  It’s common to see documents that say the same thing about the same subject several times in the same paragraph. It’s all too easy to ramble on and make the same point in different ways when you’re writing the first draft of a document. That’s okay, but be sure to then edit the copy and remove the repetitions. This helps with brevity, avoids monotony and keeps the copy fresh and readable.

   

• Cut it out.
  If you’re editing your copy, and you’re not sure whether to cut some of it out, then you should absolutely cut it out. Then cut out some more. Take the Hemmingway approach.

   

• Don’t make the visitor feel stupid.
  Einstein was a very clever chap who said, ‘Make things as simple as possible, but no simpler.’ and I wholeheartedly agree. Make sure the copy is easy to understand. Don’t use jargon, unless you are going to explain it or you are sure that your entire readership will know what it means. You might mention proprioceptive neuromuscular facilitation if you’re writing for a newsletter aimed at qualified personal trainers, but you wouldn’t use the term on a museum panel without explaining what it is.

   

• Don’t make your visitor work.
  Einstein also said, ‘If you can’t explain it to a six-year-old, then you don’t understand it yourself.’ It’s so true it hurts. Long sentences, unnecessary big words, jargon and language that’s difficult to read should all be avoided like the plague. Unfortunately, the last time most people wrote anything of length, they were writing something academic for university. That style of writing is not appropriate for visitor attractions.

   

• Explain jargon and obscure references.
  Be sure to explain any references you make in the copy. You should never open a door without allowing your reader to walk inside and understand the reference. For example, it’s no good me talking about how important ‘layering’ is here, because I haven’t yet explained what layering is. If I open that door, I need to explain it immediately.

   

• Layer the information.
  In museum interpretation writing, layering is the term we use for appealing to different audiences or reader types. Some people skim-read the headings, some read the first paragraph, and others want to read every sentence. Some are mildly interested in a topic, others want to know everything. We should ideally appeal to all of them.

  Start with a headline and don’t bother with punchlines. As a non-captive reader, they want the juicy information now. They don’t want to read through a load of guff before they get to the interesting part. Start with the most important and relevant stuff and add more detail later – if necessary. Newspaper journalists are great at this. Editors needing to save space will cut a story one paragraph at a time, starting from the bottom. Take the same approach with your writing and you won’t go far wrong.

   

• Reel ‘em in with enticing headlines and subheadings.
  Along the same lines is the advice to make your headlines relevant. The reader will often skim-read the headline to see if there is anything of interest to them, and move on if they are not immediately engaged. This is also true for websites, by the way. People skim-read the headline when they first land on a page and will click away quickly if they don’t see what they want. Headlines should be a bit like clickbait, but without the disappointing lack of delivery. They should make the visitor want to read on and find out more.

   

• If possible, use an image instead of words.
  My graphic-designer wife calls me a designer-saur. According to her, nobody wants to read boring old words anymore; they’d rather look at pretty design work, photographs and illustrations. And that’s absolutely true, more so now than ever. An image can avoid the need for lengthy and difficult-to-interpret instructions. Just ask Ikea’s clever little caricature.

   

• Chunk it up.
  A massive cliff-face of text is onerous and oppressive for the non-captive reader. There are several ways to avoid this. You can use subheadings as I have done in this post. Images are another effective and useful way to break up long lines of text. Or, you can use tint boxes and sidebars.