Adjective

1. Tending to use very long words
2. (Of words or expressions) long and ponderous; polysyllabic

As a writer, you naturally want to appear to be a subject matter expert for readers. A basic tenet of writing is to communicate your message to your audience. As such, it’s important to find the right words that resonate and quickly communicate with the reader. Don’t show off your large vocabulary at the expense of making the reader work harder to understand what you have written. Otherwise, you run the risk of losing their attention before you have a chance to make your point.

In his book Thinking Fast and Slow, Daniel Kahneman wrote, “If you care about being thought credible and intelligent, do not use complex language where simpler language will do.” Danny Oppenheimer, a colleague of Kahneman’s at Princeton, wrote a paper entitled “Consequences of Erudite Vernacular Utilized Irrespective of Necessity: Problems with Using Long Words Needlessly”. In it, he proves that expressing familiar ideas in pretentious language is taken as a sign of poor intelligence and low credibility.

In our corner of the B2B world, it’s almost impossible to discuss our clients’ products and services without using technical language, because they are so specialized. In Letting Go of the Words by Janice Redish, she wrote, “We have special words that have specific meaning in our field. We have to use them.” If everyone you are conversing with shares your special language, it’s fine to use those words. This can apply for any industry.

However, when writing a message to a potential consumer, it’s sometimes best to play it safe and steer clear of mostly jargon-related text. Per Redish, “Beware: Writers greatly overestimate how much of their company’s internal jargon others know. Research shows special vocabulary known by others is overestimated by about 25 to 30 percent.”

I feel the best advice comes from my hero, advertising icon David Ogilvy. In his memo to management titled “How To Write”, he instructs his colleagues to “Write the way you talk. Naturally. Use shorts words, short sentences and short paragraphs.”

I’d like to close with this gem, also from Mr. Ogilvy, “If you’re trying to persuade people to do something, or buy something, it seems to me you should use their language, the language they use every day, and the language in which they think.”

I couldn’t agree more.