I've been doing some experiments to improve recall of documentation.
So far i've learned a few seemingly effective techniques:
1) Occasionally construct some weird sentences, throw grammar out the window for a sentence (any longer doesn't work) and people will recall that whole section of the document, months, even years later. I have no idea why this is so effective, but i'd love to know.
2) State an assumption and have it missing the obvious consideration. Don't make it some intricate detail, it has to be in plain sight even for someone not familiar with the topic. Again, people recall these sections and are happy to suggest how you could improve the document.
3) Never tell anyone you're playing tricks like this, it completely loses its effectiveness when people know what you're doing with the slightly strange documents.
4) Test the recall of others frequently on your text. Probe them and figure out what's easy to remember and what's not. You can use this to tweak your documents for future.
5) Don't over use it. The goal doesn't have to be to have them remember everything, but it must allow them to remember where they found the information previously.
YMMV, but i'm blown away so far and i haven't seen anyone talking about this along similar lines yet. It all started after reading one too many psychology books.
Compare also bloggers who intentionally oversimplify and make small errors in their headlines/articles, guaranteeing more attention via outrage-forwarding, a vibrant comment section, and 'hook' for a followup post that extends/clarifies/apologizes.
Strightforwardness is good for many things... but not memorability.
So far i've learned a few seemingly effective techniques:
1) Occasionally construct some weird sentences, throw grammar out the window for a sentence (any longer doesn't work) and people will recall that whole section of the document, months, even years later. I have no idea why this is so effective, but i'd love to know.
2) State an assumption and have it missing the obvious consideration. Don't make it some intricate detail, it has to be in plain sight even for someone not familiar with the topic. Again, people recall these sections and are happy to suggest how you could improve the document.
3) Never tell anyone you're playing tricks like this, it completely loses its effectiveness when people know what you're doing with the slightly strange documents.
4) Test the recall of others frequently on your text. Probe them and figure out what's easy to remember and what's not. You can use this to tweak your documents for future.
5) Don't over use it. The goal doesn't have to be to have them remember everything, but it must allow them to remember where they found the information previously.
YMMV, but i'm blown away so far and i haven't seen anyone talking about this along similar lines yet. It all started after reading one too many psychology books.