Including long ‘impressive’ words in your content won’t impress many people or make everyone think you are super smart.

In fact, using lots of long words makes your writing harder to read and you appear pompous. A study in 2005 showed a negative relationships between complex writing and perception of the writer’s intelligence – in other words, overuse of big words made readers think the writer was less intelligent.

You may have developed the habit of using a bigger vocabulary at school or university – and teachers do need to see you understand a range of words and technical terms – but it’s a good habit to break when writing business materials.

Keep words and sentences short – write in the same style as you speak – be clear and concise – and your message will be understood which is the point.