Many local council's in the UK will now include a web page that explains their policy on clear language. This example from South Tyneside is deliciously concise and provides a near-perfect introduction to the world of plain English.
Style guides
Posts about and examples of creating and using style guides to keep your content clear and consistent.
2 postsPosts tagged with Style guides
How to design a style guide that people actually use
Some useful insight on designing a style guide from Angela Moore writing on the excellent Scroll blog. If you've ever needed a style guide or you have one and no one uses it, this is a really good place to start.
Allow me to share a tip of my own. It sounds silly, but there is one style guide of mine that got used the most. I knew it would make a huge impact if everyone embraced it, but there was low digital maturity in the team. So I printed hard copies out and put them on everyone's desks.
It worked because they could see it right there in front of them and watch each other use it as a reference document. Within a few months, they were adding new stuff to the guide themselves and gradually we all moved to the digital version, which was collectively kept up to date. Win!
