It is crucial to begin the writing process by determining who you are writing for. The majority of your work in college will have an audience, which is essentially a specific reader or set of readers. Your audience will have an impact on your selections about content, focus, structure, style, and tone. Who is your audience? Think about this question as you start your essay.
In order to write something that will be read, you need to know your audience. You must understand what they want to hear, how they prefer to receive it, and most important, why they should care about what you have to say. All great writers know their audience and tailor their work accordingly. As you can see, this step is very important in creating quality writing.
Consider these questions: Who will be reading my paper? What do they want to hear? How can I make my writing more interesting? These questions are just some of the many that come to mind when thinking about your audience. Always remember that you are writing for a reason and to communicate something meaningful. Write essays that speak to your audience's needs and desires. Then write some more!
Knowing who your audience is allows you to tailor the content of your writing to address their primary concerns. And, if you know your readers are experts in a certain field, your writing style should reflect this and differ from an article intended for the broader audience on the same subject. In other words, you need to know your audience before you write anything.
The first step in identifying your audience is to think about who might be interested in your writing. Are they people like you? Do you hope they are? If so, then you should write like you talk - simple, clear, accurate - and focus on producing content that will engage your readers. Otherwise, you could end up with writing that sounds dull or incomprehensible.
Next, consider what topics interest them. What questions do they have about these subjects? What needs/wants/desires are there that your writing can meet? Once you've thought about this, read widely in related areas to find out more about your audience's interests and issues. This will help you to choose relevant topics and avoid covering ground already covered by others. You also need to understand how your readers use information - whether they're looking for general advice or want to learn something specific - otherwise, your writing won't be effective.
Finally, think about why your reader might not want to read your work.
You always write to an audience, whether you realize it or not; sometimes your audience is a very broad range of readers; sometimes you know the people who make up the audience; and sometimes you write for yourself. But no matter what type of audience you have, you should always be thinking about how they will understand what you are saying.
If you are writing for yourself, then you are just trying to explain something in as clear a way as possible. That means avoiding complex language and explaining anything in detail that may help others understand your ideas better.
When you are writing for others, you need to keep in mind what type of audience you are aiming at. This will affect what kind of language you use and whether you choose to explain things in detail or not. For example, if you are writing for scientists, you would not want to use simple language because they might not understand everything you are saying. Instead, you would want to use technical terms so they know what you are talking about.
As you can see, there are many factors that come into play when deciding what type of audience you are writing for. It's important to be aware of this when writing any sort of text because it can really change how you phrase things and why some words exist.
Determine Your Target Audience:
What Is the Importance of Knowing Your Audience? Knowing your audience is critical to excellent writing, even if you don't realize it. If you don't address a certain audience correctly, you risk losing their respect, attention, and interest before they've even read your first paragraph! For example, if you write an article for a magazine that targets parents-to-be, then it would be inappropriate to include jokes about people who find out they are pregnant after they get married. Such humor might make you laugh, but it wouldn't make anyone else laugh, and as a result, you'd lose readers before they ever got a chance to learn about new baby products.
How can you tell what kind of audience you're addressing? Look at the title of your article or post, the subject line of your email, etc. This will help you choose relevant language and avoid using colloquialisms or jargon that may confuse your readers.
Knowing your audience also helps you achieve your writing goals. If you know that one of your readers likes reading about gardening, then you could include examples of gardens you've seen around town or online. This would help them feel like they can participate in your article by adding comments or questions - giving you more exposure, and thus, more readers.
Finally, knowing your audience allows you to write with clarity.