Audience

Develop the feeling that you’re writing to someone. These people, these readers, have feelings, interests, ideas and opinions of their own. The more you write what they want and need to hear, the more effective you will be with your paper.

For example, if your audience is college students (the default audience—use them unless your topic has a more appropriate specific audience), you won’t want to talk way above (or below) their heads. Use appropriate diction (word choice), give an appropriate amount of background information, but don’t bore readers with information they already know.

You should also realize that simply giving a fact rarely does the trick if it’s important and you really want it to sink in. In other words, using four sentences to get a point across will sometimes be more effective than using only one. This gives the idea time to sink into your readers’ heads—face it: few of your readers will take the time to pause and reflect and allow your ideas to really sink in and develop. You must do their thinking for them as much as possible. In general, the more you do their thinking for them, the more effective you will be as a writer.

The same goes for your paper’s pathos. If you want to create any kind of mood, you must understand that it takes more than one short paragraph or a quick story. Give it time to work. Read it over (and have other people read it over) and make sure you’ve developed it enough.

The most important thing to know about your audience (the really critical thing) in a persuasive paper is their inherent barriers. If you don’t deal with these, you will significantly lower your chances of success and miss out on one of the most insightful and helpful concepts of this class.

What's the big idea?"