Ch#4

Providing Audiences
with Usable
Information
Chapter Four
In this Chapter:
• Analyze the Document’s Audience: page 52

• Strategies for Analyzing Your Audience: page 57
• Determine the Document’s Purpose: page 57
• Create a Task Analysis for the Document: page 63
• Consider Other Related Usability Factors: page 64
• Develop an Information Plan for the Document: page 66
• Write, Test, and Revise the Document: page 68
• Checklist for Usability: page 69
• Applications: page 70
The Useability of a
Document
• To assess the usability of a manual
that comes with your new gas grill,
for instance, you would ask:
“How well do these instructions
enable me to assemble, operate, and
maintain the grill safely and
effectively?”
How to prepare a usable document?
• To prepare a usable document, follow these six steps:

1. Analyze the document’s audience.
2. Determine the document’s purpose.
3. Create a task analysis for the document.
4. Consider the setting, potential problems, length, format, timing, and
budget.
5. Develop an information plan for the document.
6. Write, test, and revise the document.
1. Analyze the Audience
• You first need to explore all you can about who will use your document.
Who is the main audience for this document?
Who else is likely to read it?
What is your relationship with the audience?
Are there multiple types of relationships involved?
How familiar might the audience be with technical details?
What culture or cultures does your audience represent?
Determinging Audiences
• When writing a technical document, keep two audiences in mind.
Primary
Secondary
Example
• A set of instructions for installing new email software for an office.

• Primary audience: the computer support staff who would be doing
the installing.
• Secondary audience: managers, who will check to see if the
instructions comply with company policy, or lawyers, who will make
sure the instructions meet legal standards.
Relationship with Audience
• You also need to understand your relationship with everyone involved.

• Determining which will help you decide the level of formality and authority to
use in the document.
o Are they going to be from inside or outside your organization?
• Answering this question will help you to decide how confidential you need to
be.
o Do you know your readers personally?
• This information can help you decide if you can adopt a more informal tone.
• Are they likely to welcome or reject your information?
Audience’s Technical Background
• For example, information about a new cancer treatment may appear

in a medical journal for health care professionals, in a textbook for
nursing or medical students, or in a newspaper article for the
general public. Always keep in mind the technical background of
your audience.
• Example page. 56
• A document’s technical level needs to target the intended audience.
Audience’s Technical
Background
• Who’s the target audience here?
Strategies for Analyzing Audiences
1. Picture your readers and exactly what they need and expect.
2. Identify the primary and secondary audiences, your relationship to them, and
their technical and cultural background.
3. When you don’t know exactly who will be reading your document, picture the
“general reader.”
4. Anticipate readers’ questions.
5. Recognize that audiences are not merely passive recipients of information.
2. Determining the Document’s Pupose
• To create an effective technical document you need to understand

how readers will use it. In other words, determine your purpose.
• Ask these questions:
1. What is the main purpose of the document?
2. What other purpose or purposes does the document serve?
3. What will readers do with this information?
Primary & Secondary Purposes
• All forms of technical communication are intended to fulfill a specific primary

purpose (to inform, to instruct, or to persuade).
• Many documents have a primary purpose and one or more secondary purposes.
o So, what is the primary purpose in most instruction manuals?
o to instruct, that is, to teach an audience how to assemble or use the product.
• But for ethical and legal reasons, companies also want people to use the product
safely. A manual for a power tool or a lawnmower, for instance, typically begins
with a page that spells out safety hazards, before instructing readers how to
assemble and use the mechanism.
Practice
• What is the primary purpose here?

Practice
• What is the primary purpose here?

Know How to Be Persuasive
• In the workplace, we rely on persuasion daily: to win coworker

support, to attract clients and customers, to request funding.
• Changing someone’s mind is never easy.
1. Using Claims as a Basis for Persuasion
2. Connecting with Your Audience
Know How to Be Persuasive (cont.)
1. Using Claims as a Basis for Persuasion

Example Claim
Because of the global recession, our software sales in two recent quarters have What the
fallen nearly 30 percent, and earnings should remain flat all year. facts are
Reduced earnings mean temporary layoffs for roughly 25 percent of our staff. But we What facts
could avoid layoffs entirely if each of us at Softbyte would accept a 10-percent salary cut the mean
until the market improves.
Our labor contract stipulates that such an across-the-board salary cut would require a two-thirds What should
majority vote. Once you’ve had time to examine the facts, we hope you’ll vote “yes” on next be done
Tuesday’s secret ballot.
2. Connecting with Your Audience. (how?)
Three approaches: the power connection, the relationship
connection, and the rational connection.
Examples P. 60-61
Know How
to Be
Persuasive
(cont.
• Filling in the audience portion of the Audience and
Purpose Profile Sheet before writing any technical
documents.
Audience
and Purpose
Profile
Sheet (p.
53)
Recap
1. Analyze the document’s audience.

2. Determine the document’s purpose
• Primary and secondary purpose
• Intended use
Know how to be persuasive
• Using claims as a basis of persuasion
• Claim is a statement of the point you are trying to prove
• What the facts are
• What the facts mean
• What should be done
3. Create a task analysis of the document
• Define main tasks then subtasks

• Example P. 64
4. Consider other related Unsability factors
• Setting
• Potential problems
• Format
• Budge
• Length
• Timing
5. Develop an information plan for the
document
• Purpose statement
• User tasks
• Setting
• Format
• Timing
6. Write, test, and revise
• Content
• Organization
• Style
• Layout and visuals
• Ethical, legal, and cultural considerations
Checklist for Usability
. Checklist for Usability: page 69

Ch#4

Uploaded by

Document Information

Original Description:

Original Title

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

Ch#4

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

Providing Audiences

• Analyze the Document’s Audience: page 52

• To prepare a usable document, follow these six steps:

• When writing a technical document, keep two audiences in mind.

• A set of instructions for installing new email software for an office.

• You also need to understand your relationship with everyone involved.

• For example, information about a new cancer treatment may appear

• To create an effective technical document you need to understand

• All forms of technical communication are intended to fulfill a specific primary

• What is the primary purpose here?

• What is the primary purpose here?

• In the workplace, we rely on persuasion daily: to win coworker

1. Using Claims as a Basis for Persuasion

1. Analyze the document’s audience.

• Define main tasks then subtasks

. Checklist for Usability: page 69

You might also like