Start reading a piece of marketing material nowadays and you’ll see bullet points left, right and centre. But are they being used correctly or just thrown in there for no good reason? I’m a big fan of bullet points when they are used well. We live in a fast paced world and get bombarded with info everywhere we turn. Having a topic on IT small business support means more key points rather than long sentences full of info. Nowadays we don’t really have time and energy to read through endless paragraphs of info. We want to have the key benefits of your products or services given to us straight up. No messing around, give it to us short and nice.
Good bullet points:
♦ Are Simple To Read
♦ Draw Your Attention
♦ Give You The Real Facts
♦ Break Up The Copy
If you can, short punchy bullet points work best. Getting each point across using minimum words is great. Your readers are able to scan through the material you’re providing and walk away with maximum information about your product or offer.
There are times when longer bullet points might be needed. Perhaps you are explaining some features, or giving guidelines. Longer bullet points can be efficient if you follow a few suggestions:
♦ Highlight the key terms of each point. Underline or bold this text – this ensures that your primary message is conveyed to the reader.
♦ Make your bullet points steady. If you have 5 bullet points they must be either short statements, full sentences or even questions –, and not a mix of each.
♦ Format your bullets consistently. Use the same font, spacing and margins. Its considered fairly old fashioned to double space your bullets today. Single spacing is definitely the way to go for short points, but extra spacing can be utilized between long or numbered points.
♦ Punctuation must be consistent. Choose to start each point having a capital letter, or in lower case – but make use of the same for the whole list. Full sentences or questions should be ended with a full stop or question mark. Short statements do not need a full stop.
♦ Don’t make bullet points too long. They are not a paragraph and are intended to speed up information gathering. Try and keep to three lines as a maximum.
♦ Know when to use a bullet rather than a number. Actual bullets are fantastic when there are only a few. If you have more than 6 points, numbering them may be easier for the reader to keep track of.
Understanding these basic principles will get you writing great bullet points in no time. Not only will bullet points benefit your readers, but they will help you as well. You won’t have to spend as much time developing sentences and making sure your paragraphs flow. Bullet points allow you to use simple punctuation and structures which will save you valuable time. Treat your bullet points such as headlines – short, informative and convincing – and you won’t go wrong.
To learn more, check out Icreate Solutions.
Good bullet points:
♦ Are Simple To Read
♦ Draw Your Attention
♦ Give You The Real Facts
♦ Break Up The Copy
If you can, short punchy bullet points work best. Getting each point across using minimum words is great. Your readers are able to scan through the material you’re providing and walk away with maximum information about your product or offer.
There are times when longer bullet points might be needed. Perhaps you are explaining some features, or giving guidelines. Longer bullet points can be efficient if you follow a few suggestions:
♦ Highlight the key terms of each point. Underline or bold this text – this ensures that your primary message is conveyed to the reader.
♦ Make your bullet points steady. If you have 5 bullet points they must be either short statements, full sentences or even questions –, and not a mix of each.
♦ Format your bullets consistently. Use the same font, spacing and margins. Its considered fairly old fashioned to double space your bullets today. Single spacing is definitely the way to go for short points, but extra spacing can be utilized between long or numbered points.
♦ Punctuation must be consistent. Choose to start each point having a capital letter, or in lower case – but make use of the same for the whole list. Full sentences or questions should be ended with a full stop or question mark. Short statements do not need a full stop.
♦ Don’t make bullet points too long. They are not a paragraph and are intended to speed up information gathering. Try and keep to three lines as a maximum.
♦ Know when to use a bullet rather than a number. Actual bullets are fantastic when there are only a few. If you have more than 6 points, numbering them may be easier for the reader to keep track of.
Understanding these basic principles will get you writing great bullet points in no time. Not only will bullet points benefit your readers, but they will help you as well. You won’t have to spend as much time developing sentences and making sure your paragraphs flow. Bullet points allow you to use simple punctuation and structures which will save you valuable time. Treat your bullet points such as headlines – short, informative and convincing – and you won’t go wrong.
To learn more, check out Icreate Solutions.
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