Technical Writing

2. AUDIENCE ANALYSIS

The audience of a technical writing—or any piece of writing for that matter—is the intended or

potential reader or readers. For most technical writers, this is the most important consideration in

planning, writing, and reviewing a document. You “adapt” your writing to meet the needs, interests,

and background of the readers who will be reading your writing. In reality, the lack of audience

analysis and adaptation is one of the root causes of most of the problems you find in professional,

technical documents—particularly instructions where it surfaces most glaringly.

Note: Once you’ve read this chapter on audiences, try using the audience planner. You fill in blanks

with answers to questions about your audience and then e-mail it to yourself and, optionally, to your

instructor. Use the audience planner for any writing project as a way of getting yourself to think about

your audience in detail.

Chapter Attribution Information

This chapter was derived by Annemarie Hamlin, Chris Rubio, and Michele DeSilva, Central Oregon

Community College, from Online Technical Writing by David McMurrey – CC: BY 4.0

2 . 1 T Y P E S O F AU D I E N C E S

One of the first things to do when you analyze an audience is to identify its type (or types—it’s rarely

just one type). The common division of audiences into categories is as follows:

• Experts: These are the people who know the business or organization (and possibly the theory

and the product) inside and out. They designed it, they tested it, they know everything about it.

Often, they have advanced degrees and operate in academic settings or in research and

development areas of the government and technology worlds.

• Technicians: These are the people who build, operate, maintain, and repair the items that the

experts design and theorize about. Theirs is a highly technical knowledge as well, but of a more

practical nature.

• Executives: These are the people who make business, economic, administrative, legal,

governmental, political decisions about the products of the experts and technicians. Executives are

likely to have as little technical knowledge about the subject as nonspecialists. For many of you,

this will be the primary audience.

• Nonspecialists: These readers have the least technical knowledge of all. They want to use the new

product to accomplish their tasks; they want to understand the new power technology enough to

know whether to vote for or against it in the upcoming bond election. Or, they may just be curious

about a specific technical matter and want to learn about it—but for no specific, practical reason.

Chances are, these readers will represent your secondary audience.

C H A P T E R AT T R I B U T I O N I N F O R M AT I O N

This chapter was derived by Annemarie Hamlin, Chris Rubio, and Michele DeSilva, Central Oregon

Community College, from Online Technical Writing by David McMurrey – CC: BY 4.0

TECHNICAL WRITING 21

2 . 2 AU D I E N C E A N A LY S I S

It’s important to determine which of the four categories just discussed represent your potential

audience(s), but that’s not the end of it. Audiences, regardless of category, must also be analyzed in

terms of characteristics such as the following:

• Background—knowledge, experience, training: One of your most important concerns is just

how much knowledge, experience, or training you can expect in your readers. If you expect some

of your readers to lack certain background, do you automatically supply it in your document?

Consider an example: imagine you are writing a guide to using a software product that runs under

Microsoft Windows. How much can you expect your readers to know about Windows? If some are

likely to know little about Windows, should you provide that information? If you say no, then you

run the risk of customers getting frustrated with your product. If you say yes to adding

background information on Windows, you increase your work effort and add to the page count of

the document (and thus to the cost). Obviously, there’s no easy answer to this question—part of the

answer may involve just how small a segment of the audience needs that background information.

• Needs and interests: To plan your document, you need to know what your audience is going to

expect from that document. Imagine how readers will want to use your document; what they will

demand from it. For example, imagine you are writing a manual on how to use a new

smartphone—what are your readers going to expect to find in it? Imagine you are under contract

to write a background report on global warming for a national real estate association—what do

readers want to read about; and, equally important, what do they not want to read about?

• Other demographic characteristics: And of course there are many other characteristics about

your readers that might have an influence on how you should design and write your

document—for example, age groups, type of residence, area of residence, gender, political

preferences, and so on.

Audience analysis can get complicated by at least two other factors: mixed audience types for one

document, wide variability within audience, and unknown audiences.

• More than one audience: You are likely to find that your report is for more than one audience.

For example, it may be seen by technical people (experts and technicians) and administrative

people (executives). What should you do in this case? You can either write all the sections so that all

the audiences of your document can understand them. Or you can write each section strictly for

the audience that would be interested in it, then use headings and section introductions to alert

your audience about where to find relevant information in your report.

22 ALLISON GROSS, ANNEMARIE HAMLIN, BILLY MERCK, CHRIS RUBIO, JODI NAAS, MEGAN SAVAGE, AND MICHELE DESILVA

• Wide variability in an audience: You may realize that, although you have an audience that fits

into only one category, its background varies widely. This is a tough one—if you write to the

lowest common denominator of reader, you are likely to end up with a cumbersome, tedious

book-like report that will turn off the majority of readers. However, if you don’t write to that

lowest level, you lose that segment of your readers. What should you do? Most writers go for the

majority of readers and sacrifice that minority that needs more help. Others put the supplemental

information in appendixes or insert cross-references to beginners’ books.

C H A P T E R AT T R I B U T I O N I N F O R M AT I O N

This chapter was derived by Annemarie Hamlin, Chris Rubio, and Michele DeSilva, Central Oregon

Community College, from Online Technical Writing by David McMurrey – CC: BY 4.0

TECHNICAL WRITING 23

2 . 3 A DA P T I N G YO U R W R I T I N G TO M E E T YO U R AU D I E N C E ’ S N E E D S

Once you’ve analyzed your audience, how do you use this information? How do you keep from

writing something that may potentially still be incomprehensible or useless to your readers? Draft

your document with your audience’s needs in mind, but remember that writing can be refined over

many drafts. With each subsequent draft, think more carefully about your readers, and revise and

edit your document so that you make technical information more understandable for nonspecialist

audiences. The lists below are some of the ways you can adapt your writing to your audience’s needs.

The following “controls” have mostly to do with making technical information more

understandable for nonspecialist audiences, and they refer to information you will refine as you begin

to put your final report together. However, it is a good idea to be aware of your audience’s needs even

in the early stages of your report drafting.

P ROV I D E T H E R I G H T I N F O R M AT I O N

Add information readers need to understand your document. Check to see whether certain key

information is missing—for example, a critical series of steps from a set of instructions; important

background that helps beginners understand the main discussion; definition of key terms.

Omit information your readers do not need. Unnecessary information can also confuse and

frustrate readers—after all, it’s there so they feel obligated to read it. For example, you can probably

chop theoretical discussion from basic instructions.

Change the level of the information you currently have. You may have the right information but

it may be “pitched” at too high or too low a technical level. It may be pitched at the wrong kind of

audience—for example, at an expert audience rather than a technician audience. This happens most

often when product-design notes are passed off as instructions.

Add examples to help readers understand. Examples are one of the most powerful ways to

connect with audiences, particularly in instructions. Even in a non-instructional text, for example,

when you are trying to explain a technical concept, examples are a major help—analogies in particular.

Change the level of your examples. You may be using examples but the technical content or level

may not be appropriate to your readers. Homespun examples may not be useful to experts; highly

technical ones may totally miss your nonspecialist readers.

G U I D E YO U R R E A D E R T H RO U G H YO U R W R I T I N G

Change the organization of your information. Sometimes, you can have all the right information

but arrange it in the wrong way. For example, there can be too much background information up

front (or too little) such that certain readers get lost. Sometimes, background information needs to be

24 ALLISON GROSS, ANNEMARIE HAMLIN, BILLY MERCK, CHRIS RUBIO, JODI NAAS, MEGAN SAVAGE, AND MICHELE DESILVA

consolidated into the main information—for example, in instructions it’s sometimes better to feed in

chunks of background at the points where they are immediately needed.

Strengthen transitions. It may be difficult for readers, particularly nonspecialists, to see the

connections between the main sections of your report, between individual paragraphs, and sometimes

even between individual sentences. You can make these connections much clearer by adding transition

words and by echoing key words more accurately. Words like “therefore,” “for example,” “however” are

transition words—they indicate the logic connecting the previous thought to the upcoming thought.

You can also strengthen transitions by carefully echoing the same key words. A report describing new

software for architects might use the word software several times on the same page or even in the

same paragraph. In technical prose, it’s not a good idea to vary word choice—use the same words so

that people don’t get any more confused than they may already be.

Write stronger introductions—both for the whole document and for major sections. People

seem to read with more confidence and understanding when they have the “big picture”—a view of

what’s coming, and how it relates to what they’ve just read. Therefore, write a strong introduction

to the entire document—one that makes clear the topic, purpose, audience, and contents of that

document. And for each major section within your document, use mini-introductions that indicate at

least the topic of the section and give an overview of the subtopics to be covered in that section.

Create topic sentences for paragraphs and paragraph groups. It can help readers immensely to

give them an idea of the topic and purpose of a section (a group of paragraphs) and in particular to give

them an overview of the subtopics about to be covered. Road maps help when you’re in a different

state!

C R A F T E F F E C T I V E S E N T E N C E S

Change sentence style and length. How you write—down at the individual sentence level—can

make a big difference too. In instructions, for example, using imperative voice and “you” phrasing

is vastly more understandable than the passive voice or third-personal phrasing. For some reason,

personalizing your writing style and making it more relaxed and informal can make it more accessible

and understandable. Passive, person-less writing is harder to read—put people and action in your

writing. Similarly, go for active verbs as opposed to be verb phrasing. All of this makes your writing

more direct and immediate—readers don’t have to dig for it. And obviously, sentence length matters

as well. An average of somewhere between 15 and 25 words per sentence is about right; sentences

over 30 words are to be mistrusted.

Edit for sentence clarity and economy. This is closely related to the previous “control” but

deserves its own spot. Often, writing style can be so wordy that it is hard or frustrating to read. When

you revise your rough drafts, put them on a diet—go through a draft line by line trying to reduce the

overall word, page, or line count by 20 percent. Try it as an experiment and see how you do. You’ll

find a lot of fussy, unnecessary detail and inflated phrasing you can chop out.

M A K E YO U R D O C U M E N T V I S UA L LY A P P E A L I N G

Add and vary graphics. For nonspecialist audiences, you may want to use more graphics—and

simpler ones at that. Graphics for specialists are more detailed, more technical. In technical

documents for nonspecialists, there also tend to be more “decorative” graphics—ones that are

attractive but serve no strict informative or persuasive purpose at all.

Break text up or consolidate text into meaningful, usable chunks. For nonspecialist readers, you

TECHNICAL WRITING 25

may need to have shorter paragraphs. Maybe a 6- to 8-line paragraph is the usual maximum. Notice

how much longer paragraphs are in technical documents written for specialists.

Add cross-references to important information. In technical information, you can help

nonspecialist readers by pointing them to background sources. If you can’t fully explain a topic on the

spot, point to a section or chapter where it is.

Use headings and lists. Readers can be intimidated by big dense paragraphs of writing, uncut by

anything other than a blank line now and then. Search your rough drafts for ways to incorporate

headings—look for changes in topic or subtopic. Search your writing for listings of things—these can

be made into vertical lists. Look for paired listings such as terms and their definitions—these can

be made into two-column lists. Of course, be careful not to force this special formatting, and don’t

overdo it.

Use special typography, and work with margins, line length, line spacing, type size, and type

style. For nonspecialist readers, you can do things like making the lines shorter (bringing in the

margins), using larger type sizes, and other such tactics. Typically, sans-serif fonts, such as Ariel, are

useful for online readers. Serif fonts, such as Time New Roman, are useful for print texts.

By now you should be able to see that many of the decisions you make as a technical writer

depend on who will read your report. From content, to language, to layout, every aspect of your

communication must keep your readers’ needs in mind.

We will spend time later in this book expanding our discussion of audience as well as document

design–an important consideration that can help tremendously in making your document

professional and easy to read.

C H A P T E R AT T R I B U T I O N I N F O R M AT I O N

This chapter was derived by Annemarie Hamlin, Chris Rubio, and Michele DeSilva, Central Oregon

Community College, from Online Technical Writing by David McMurrey – CC: BY 4.0

26 ALLISON GROSS, ANNEMARIE HAMLIN, BILLY MERCK, CHRIS RUBIO, JODI NAAS, MEGAN SAVAGE, AND MICHELE DESILVA