Writing Tip for Opinion Essays
Make Your Point and Stay on Point
To persuade your readers, stay focused
I enjoy reading opinion essays — and there’s no shortage of them these days. But whether you’re a nationally syndicated columnist or an amateur blogger, you need to do these two things to create an effective opinion piece:
1. Make your point.
2. Stick to your point.
Your headline (title) and first paragraph should clearly tell the reader what the point of your message is. Everything that follows should reinforce your opening.
In conversation, it’s easy to get distracted and wander down rabbit trails as you tell stories and express yourself. When I’m at a dinner party, I’m a master at starting one story, interrupting myself to tell another one and maybe even another one, while promising to get back to my original point (sometimes I do, sometimes I don’t).
But when you do that in writing, you just confuse your readers and leave them feeling like they’ve wasted their valuable time because they don’t know what you meant to say.
Today’s political and social issues can get complex, but if you want to persuade others to your point of view, you need to keep your writing simple and on target.
