Content Information
Good content is clear, useful, and friendly. It should help Iowans work toward their goals, and ours. Follow these principles:
- Be direct – Write succinctly and to the point. Avoid fluff.
- Be clear – Write simply. Don’t disappoint audiences with acronyms, jargon, internal language, or vagueness.
- Be confident – Confidence inspires action and comfort.
- Be human – Write conversationally, as if you were interacting with the reader in person. Use personal pronouns – we, our, you, your – instead of formality.
NOTE: This Style Guide is expected to be updated to include brand marks, colors, and fonts when the enterprise brand information is available in the future.
Voice and Tone
Our voice can best be defined in three ways:
- Disciplined, but not bureaucratic
- Welcoming, but not colloquial
- Proud, but not smug
Our goal is to write in a way that conveys the state of Iowa is:
- Trustworthy
- Sincere
- Helpful
To meet these goals and ensure readability and smoother translation, content written for Iowa.gov and our agencies should be written at an 8th-grade reading level or below.
Our tone is casual, but not informal or unprofessional. In writing, we’ll:
- Use contractions
- Avoid negative statements (don’t, can’t, won’t)
- Speak directly to the reader, using we/our/you/your second-person statements
- Write like we talk, and use active verbs, especially for calls-to-action and next steps
- Eliminate jargon
Voice characteristic | Description | Do | Don’t |
|---|---|---|---|
Disciplined | We provide instructions and guides to help Iowans complete tasks without government jargon. | Use ordered or bulleted lists with plain language to guide tasks. | Avoid government or agency jargon or bloat instructions with unnecessary information. |
Welcoming | We’re friendly, sincere, and helpful but not informal or unprofessional. | Write clearly with contractions, second-person speech (you, we, our), and positive language. | Avoid colloquial terms, Midwest slang, or other terms that muddle the message. |
Proud | We’re proud of our state, its people, and our work, but don’t brag or gloat accomplishments where it’s not needed. | Write about pride from an all-Iowa perspective, not to boast individual accomplishments. | Avoid bragging and absolutisms, e.g. being “the best” or “greatest.” |
Who is Our Audience?
Write content focused on what your web visitors need to do. Start by thinking about what your agency or organization does and the many types of people it serves:
- As a… [who is the target audience?] I want to… [what does the audience want to do?] so I can…[what is the audience’s goal?]
How you refer to Iowans and the general public is dependent on context. Choose from any of the words on this list:
- People
- Residents
- The public
- Constituents
We avoid the word “citizens” as not everyone who uses Iowa.gov and our agency sites is a citizen. Use “citizens” only when specifically writing about U.S. citizenship  –  for example, when describing who can vote in federal elections.