Style in action

Accessible language

• Using clear and concise language is important as not everyone reading our content speaks English as their first language.
• Run your copy through the Hemingway Editor to help – itʼs a brilliant tool
• Also avoid idioms or slang specific to certain cultures to ensure the content is as accessible and inclusive as possible. A helpful resource for understanding inclusive language can be found here.
• Use contractions to sound more conversational and natural. This’ll make you sound much more human!

Sentence case

• Writing in sentence case is easier for users to read and comprehend, it sounds more friendly and informal, and it helps better identify proper nouns and branded terms that need to be capitalized.

Get it right:

• Only capitalize the first word in a phrase or title.
• Always capitalize proper nouns and branded terms (e.g., Cint Exchange)
• Capitalize acronyms (e.g., MR, MM)

Title case

• Use title case only when it clarifies that we’re speaking about a specific, official entity (such as a title or name).
• Title case is often a marker of formality in English, and overuse can cause users stress by implying formality or officialness where it doesn’t exist.

All caps

All caps should NEVER be used to emphasize a point. See? Horrible.

This includes the name of our company: We are ‘Cint’, never ‘CINT’ or ‘cint’.

Ampersand

Donʼt use ampersands (&) in any copy. Instead, spell out the word “and”. Using the word “andˮ is more inclusive, localizable, and readable:

• Itʼs more widely known and understood for people who are non-fluent English speakers.
• It translates more easily into many languages.
• Spelled-out words require less mental and cognitive effort to read.
• Ampersands bring attention to the conjunction in a phrase which is the least important part of the sentence.
• Since it’s taller than many letters and is an unusual shape, ampersands can be distracting for readers.

Emoji

• Emoji should only be used on social media and very sparingly in email comms (for example, where itʼs been proven to increase open rates).
• Itʼs always ‘emojiʼ when youʼre writing about them – whether single or plural. Not ‘emojis.ʼ
• An important thing to note is that emoji often convey tones that may be inappropriate in certain contexts.
• They also make copy difficult to read and may not be accessible (for example, for someone using screen readers).

Exclamation marks

Donʼt use exclamation marks (!!!!!) since they are easy to overuse and can make the copy flow seem hectic and chaotic.

Question mark

When writing titles, questions marks (?) are the only acceptable punctuation mark to include, and avoid using them to ask rhetorical questions. As if youʼd ever do that?

Time

Cint is a global company operating within many different time zones, and we will regularly have times and dates we need to share through our content.

To keep things simple, adhere to the following guidelines:

• Do not use :00 with whole numbers
• When presenting a range of time, use an en dash without spaces in between, and do not include am or pm on the first time if itʼs the same as the last – e.g., “The webinar will take place 2-3pm BSTˮ
• When translating to 24-hour time, do not include am and pm (e.g., 17:15)

Lists

Use lists to break down complex ideas and make them more readable and scannable. Keep the following rules in mind when creating content for Cint:

• Use bulleted (unordered) lists to present two or more concepts of equal weight.
• Use numbered (ordered) lists to present a series of sequential steps.
• Phrase your list items to be consistent with each other as much as possible. This helps with comprehension and readability.

Additional things to keep in mind when writing lists:

• Capitalize the first letter of each list item.
• Donʼt use terminal punctuation (periods) in list items, unless it is a complete sentence or sentences.
• If the list includes action items (as in a series of instructions), the entire list should follow the same format, with the verb first. If itʼs a list of nouns, all items on the list should include nouns.