Flesch Reading Ease: What It Is and Why It Matters
Great writing should feel effortless to read. Your audience should breeze through your writing without losing interest. If it’s harder to read, then it’s harder to understand.
This is why the Flesch Reading Ease score is important. In the 1940s, Dr. Rudolph Flesch developed the Flesch Reading Ease test to gauge how easy it is to read someone’s writing. This test uses a scoring system to analyze the complexity of your writing and grades it based on how easy or difficult it is to understand.
What Is Flesch Reading Ease?
Before the Flesch Reading Ease test, there was no standardized way for writers to measure their work’s readability.
Dr. Flesch realized a test could help score a writer’s work, especially jargon-filled topics in law and medicine, where arcane and complex writing made it challenging to understand. He began developing the Flesch Reading Ease formula to measure readability:
206.835 – 1.015 * (total words/total sentences) – 84.6 * (total syllables/total words)
While the Flesch Reading Ease score is useful for independently measuring readability, it does not help to translate those scores back to the audience’s context. In the 1970s, J. Peter Kincaid updated Flesch’s formula, with consideration of the audience’s context, and created the Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level formula:
0.39 * (total words/total sentences) + 11.8 * (total syllables/total words) – 15.59
This Flesch-Kincaid grade level formula indicates the average grade level necessary to understand the content. For example, an 8th-grade reading level.
How Flesch Reading Ease Works
The Flesch Reading Ease test uses two variables to measure readability:
- The number of words per sentence
- The number of syllables per word
These variables are incorporated into the Flesch Reading Ease formula, which gives a score between 1 and 100, with 100 being the highest and most readable.
What Is a Good Flesch Reading Ease Score?
Scoring 60 or above is typically the target for content, as this score indicates the content is easy to read for most adults. However, your benchmark will depend on your target audience.
The driving philosophy behind the Flesch Reading Ease formula is that longer sentences with longer words are harder to understand. Shorter sentence lengths with shorter word lengths will score higher on the test and are more readable.
Why Readability Matters For Your Marketing
In marketing, clarity is key. Whether you’re writing a web article, white paper, or social media post, your message must be understood by your audience. Keeping your material readable ensures that your brand and ideas can be absorbed easily by readers. When you improve the accessibility of your content, you can improve its web traffic and engagement.
Studies show that readers tend to disengage when text feels overly complex or verbose, which can lead to lower engagement and conversions. Here’s why readability matters:
- Capturing Attention: Content that’s easier to read is far more likely to capture your audience’s attention. Short, direct sentences and familiar vocabulary allow readers to process information quickly.
- Building Trust and Accessibility: Readable content signals to your audience that you value their time and effort. By removing jargon and technical language, your content becomes more accessible to a wider audience, building trust and improving brand perception.
- Driving Action: Effective marketing content will have a clear call to action. Whether it’s interacting with your brand online or signing up for a newsletter, readable content makes it easier for your audience to take action.
How to Lower Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level
Reaping the benefits of readability in your marketing content is a matter of reducing your content’s Flesch-Kincaid grade level. Writers and editors should follow the tips below when creating content to achieve proper readability. These tips can be particularly helpful while tackling content refreshes if the legacy content scores a grade level unsuitable for the target audience.
Simplify Sentence Structure
The biggest culprit of bad readability is complicated syntax. Try to break down complex ideas into shorter, standalone sentences.
This will improve readability and emphasize key points more effectively. Avoid long, run-on sentences since these convolute your message and negatively impact readability.
Use Active Voice For Clarity
Writing in the active voice tends to be more direct and engaging for your audience. Instead of writing, “The results were analyzed by the team,” try “The team analyzed the results.”
By reframing your sentences to focus on the subject and what actions they took, you improve the readability of your work.
Choose Simple Words
Long words are easy to spot on the screen and easy to replace or remove. Complex and technical jargon can make it challenging for readers to follow your content. Instead of saying “utilize,” say “use.” Instead of saying “facilitate,” say “help.”
These changes can dramatically improve how readable your writing is and impact your Flesch Reading Ease score.
Break Up Your Paragraphs
Longer paragraphs can be difficult to read and hard to follow. Break your writing into shorter, more meaningful paragraphs to help readers navigate your text and better understand what you’re trying to convey. Keep in mind your readers may be viewing content on a mobile device and need to scroll.
Ideally, each paragraph should focus on one idea at a time. This structure not only makes your writing appear more approachable but also keeps readers engaged throughout the piece.
Add Visual Breaks
Oftentimes, readers don’t like to engage with a big wall of text. By using elements like headings, bullet points, or numbered lists, you can break up dense blocks of text to make your writing more visually accessible.
These visual breaks provide structure to your writing, helping to highlight key points and guide readers to important information without overwhelming them.
Readability Tests & Your Content Creation Process
A readability test is critical to successful writing. Your goal is to create content that can be easily understood by your audience and is enjoyable to read.
That’s why the Flesch Reading Ease score, as well as the Flesh-Kincaid grade level scoring, are both effective metrics to gauge the readability of your writing.
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High-quality writing and editing are tough to manage consistently and at scale on your own. ContentWriters is the solution to address these writing team challenges.
With industry-specialized and SEO-skilled writers, we help simplify operations and deliver accessible and engaging content that resonates with your audience.
Contact ContentWriters today to help improve the readability and performance of your content.
An earlier version of this post was published in December, 2019 by Ellen F.
Animesh is a professional writer with expertise in business, tech and marketing.
