Posted by
Untold fact: If your writing is hard to read, it’s even harder to understand. It is not the complexity of words that makes your writing interesting but the information you put forward is the ingredient that makes it likable.
Not everyone is proficient in English. They might be able to read in English but can understand up to a certain level. Some might take English as their second language. Thus, it’s important that the writing is understandable for all. When the sentences are long, the words are arcane and hidden; it becomes complex for readers to comprehend the meaning of the sentence. Flesch reading ease test A.K.A Flesch–Kincaid Readability Tests indicate the difficulty level in understanding the writing. For your Content Writing Services to be effective on the readers, it must be easily understandable. Let’s dive further into this article and unveil the significance of the Flesch reading ease test.
What Is the Flesch Reading Ease Score Test?
Some sentences are designed to make the reading as difficult as possible especially in the legal domain. On the other hand, the difficulty level for little champs is kept low. After discovering various levels of difficulty in readability, Dr. Rudolf Flesch developed a formula to determine readability.
This formula helps in keeping the index of readability in the range that’s understandable by the audience to ensure Effective Content Marketing.
How does The Flesch Reading Ease Test work?
The Flesch readability score takes two weighing factors into consideration:
- Number of words per sentence
- Number of syllables per word
The higher you score in the Flesch reading ease test, the easier to read your writing is. Lower scores indicate that your content is difficult to read.
The formula for the Flesch reading ease score (FRES) test is:
The score guides you when you need to modify your writing to make it more engaging and understandable. The ideal Flesch Reading Ease score for an article can be 70 while is readable by adults.
Sometimes you can not ignore complicated and long-length words, but you can manage the Flesch score by reducing the length of the sentence.
How to Improve Flesch Reading Ease Score?
Now that you’re ready to work on your writing and bind your audience with interesting and more readable content, we are ready to share a few healthy tips with you to improve the Flesch reading ease score. Here are a few tips for you to improve your Flesch reading score and excel in writing.
1. Start Writing And Go With The Flow
You can not achieve perfection in your first draft. The first draft is for you to bring out everything on the table, your thoughts, beliefs, your knowledge, etc. It is not the time to be in control of certain rules and regulations. Else, you will create a barrier in writing and won’t be able to complete it in time. So, without any restrictions, simply let your words flow on paper and shape them later. Once you complete your first draft move to the next step, i.e., to polish the words.
2. Next, Target Long Tail Keywords
When you have a complete draft, you can start by identifying long words/ phrases. Consider replacing them with small simpler words without changing the meaning of the sentence. You will notice that this simple change of replacing larger and complicated words from sentences with easy ones can help you improve the Flesch reading ease score.
3. At Last, Shorten The Sentences or Break Into Phrases.
The draft of your writing can be easily modified later. In fact, the step above to reduce the length and complexity of the words with the help you to shorten the sentences as well. The presence of longer sentences in your writeup leads to nothing but confusion. More words can alter the meaning of the sentence, making it less worthy.
There are three ways to reduce the length of the sentence to improve the Flesch Reading score-
- Rewrite the sentence with the use of short words and phrases.
- Break the whole sentence into parts
- Use tools like Grammarly to find alternative words.
Once you rephrase the sentences, you will find they are much more readable and understandable than before.
4. Use Cases of Flesch Reading Ease Score (FRES) Test
- According to Leah Borovoi from Infinity Labs, the calculated Flesch score for the seven Harry Potter books have an average Flesch score of 72.83.
- The calculated Flesch score for Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone is 81.32.
- The calculated Flesch score for Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix is 65.88.
It has been over 70 years now and the Flesch Reading Ease score is used by marketers, researchers, readers, writers to name a few to enhance the user experience of the novel, blog, website, etc.
5. Why You Must Consider Checking the Flesch Reading Score Before Publishing Your Content?
Writers when asked to reduce the complexity of their writeup feel a little perplexed and irritated. They think that it is asked to revile them in some way. This is not the case here, It is asked to improve the readability of the content and make it more relatable and easily comprehensible by the readers.
Flesch reading score allows you to provide the Content Writing Tips according to the level of your audience; be it a student of class 3rd or a professional from a university.
Conclusion: Content Is Nothing If It Doesn’t Add Value To The Readers
Just like other useful parameters to measure the goodness of a content, Flesch reading ease score test is also faultless. Give it a try, if you want your writing to be unbeatable and polished.
The aim of a writer is not to write but to convey his/her message loud and clear and that can only happen when you focus on increasing the readability of your content with the Flesch Reading Ease Score (FRES) test.