Good writing skills are very necessary for marketing your brand. When it comes to expanding your business, knowing how to write clearly and intently is essential. You want to be able to be purposeful with everything you write. Because writing is present in the majority of marketing aspects, knowing what transition words are and how to immerse them into your writing is a step towards getting through to viewers and improving SEO. SEO, or search engine optimization, is a marketing strategy that will be greatly improved if you pay attention to the message you are putting across with your writing.
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What Are Transition Words?
In the English language, there are about 200 common ones. These words are responsible for contrasting or emphasizing ideas in a certain way that links their relationship together. Since we aren’t going to go over all 200 of these words, let’s dive into some broad examples of what they might look like.
Common Transition Words
Examples of transition words include “furthermore,” “similarly,” and “despite.” Sound familiar? These are the words that connect thoughts and allow for a reset when exchanging your own ideas. You may already use these words quite frequently in your writing without even thinking about it, or knowing what impact they have.
On the contrary, you may realize that you don’t use transitional words at all. It is good to recognize your use of these words, how often you use them and how you use them. Once you bring attention to your own usage, you can hold yourself accountable and make writing goals for transition words. Ask yourself before submitting your writing: do I have transition words? Are these words helpful?
Moving forward, we will talk about what makes a transition word “good” and what makes a transition word an over-explanation. Using transition words, along with effectively connecting transition words to paragraphs, will make a big difference in your ability to get your brand’s message across.
Good Transition Words
A good transition word will have a certain purpose as to why it is being used. These purposes may be:
- Causation (because, since, therefore)
- Location (above, nearby, here)
- Contrast (but, yet, otherwise)
- Chronology (once, now, next)
- Importance (primarily, critically)
- Conclusion (finally, lastly)
- Example (specifically, e.g.,)
These are only some of the many types of transition words that take place in our English language today.
But what makes all of these transition words? What do these words all have in common? The answer is quite simple. They all assist in demonstrating a type of relationship between ideas, connecting different elements by suggesting how they are similar, different, or somewhat bonded together. These words are important because they allow for a smoother reading and writing experience. When sentences are connected, the whole reading seems to flow together and become a whole. This creates engaging content for your viewers.
Purpose of Transition Words
What are transition words going to do for your brand? They are going to be a step towards making your writing clear to your audience, which will allow them to have a better understanding of what you are saying with your marketing. You always want to keep in mind who your audience is while writing for your brand.
You know your brand best, you know what makes it unique. What does your audience know? How can you simplify your brand for them? They are not the expert that you are with your business. Using transition words will help make your brand easier to understand. Writers need to be able to use good structure and clear transitions in their work in order for the audience to get your brand as much as you do. Phrases and paragraphs must be connected thoroughly for your marketing skills to take off.
Transitional Phrases
Not all types of transitions are merely words. When looking at a transition from a wider perspective, it allows a reader to fully connect to the ideas being presented. These ideas are transitional phrases. What are transitional phrases? Like transition words, phrases connect the reader from one thought to another. The difference, however, is that it is more than merely the word being looked at, but the whole phrase.
Looking at transitions through the lens of a phrase is beneficial to making your writing flow and reading over your work as you write. Viewing phrases for their transitions will ultimately improve your marketing strategy and improve on-page optimization. This is because even though readers may not think about what transition words are, they will subconsciously appreciate the way the writing connects and flows. Without these words and phrases, readers may get lost or misinterpret what you are trying to tell them.
Transitional phrases allow for thoughts to be less jumbled and more organized. You have to talk to your viewers in the simplest way possible and explain things to them assuming they have no prior experience with what you are informing them about. You don’t want your client to feel confused or uninformed about what you do. It will take transitional phrases to make your ideas less messy so they will understand your points and be able to make a personal connection with your brand.
Transition Words for Paragraphs
We have yet to get the big picture of transition words and their true effect on writing. There is still more to what transition words are. It isn’t just important to look at transition words and their phrases, but how they connect paragraphs together. Transition words for paragraphs create signals or hints for readers. They imply certain relationships between paragraphs that suggest or elaborate relationships between information. These connections that are made are used specifically for two consecutive paragraphs.
For example, a transition word will take place in a paragraph which expands on the idea expressed in the paragraph before it. Without signaling these relationships, the viewer doesn’t get as clear of a depiction of what is being said, and how the ideas expressed go together. It is still possible for the reader to make connections as they read without transition words for paragraphs, but it will not have the same effect. Connecting paragraphs makes your writing more transparent, more effective, and overall more worthwhile.
How to Use Transition Words
Transition words should be used only occasionally. Overuse of these words will make them lose their powerful effect. They should also be planned accordingly, used at times when it will be most beneficial to connect thoughts and ideas logically. While you want to make things easy for your viewers to understand, over-explaining will become exhausting after some time. Try to use transition words where you deem seem fit, however, they are commonly used to open or conclude thoughts within a paragraph.
It will take practice, so do not feel disheartened if your writing seems choppy at first. As you continue writing, ask your colleague(s) or editor(s) for feedback. Each mistake you make will get you closer to your goal of becoming a wonderful writer for your brand. As you get feedback, strive to learn and improve for each project. Once you have effectively learned when to use your transitions and how many to use, incorporating these ideas will become easier. Pretty soon, you will be the one offering feedback to others.
The Big Picture on Transition Words
Now that we have gone through what transition words are, it is important that we make the connections (just like good transition words do) as to why each layer of the transitional structure is important.
Ensuring rational connections between paragraphs, phrases, and words informs readers on what they should be focusing on and which ideas relate to one another. Immersing transition words into your writing will allow certain writing flaws to be avoided, such as difficulty to read, difficulty to understand main points, and unnecessary information that doesn’t relate to the topic.
Transition words are there to help not only your reader but you. Transition words help you by:
- Supporting your ideas
- Concluding your thoughts
- Making your ideas easy to understand
Once you get used to incorporating these important writing connections, your marketing strategy will begin to flourish to its full potential. Writing logistically and being able to recognize the needs of your audience will set you apart from other businesses, increasing traffic to your site. Your clients want to know that you care not only about their needs but about your business. Having pride in what you write and working on making clear and concise points in your work will help you out in the long run.
Help With Marketing Writing
If you aren’t confident in your marketing writing abilities, it is a great idea to find a full-service marketing company to aid you. SEO Design Chicago is a specialized team of marketing professionals, with years of experience. Skip the guesswork and contact us now!
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