British Council house style is a set of conventions that aim to ensure consistency and clarity in our writing. Using plain English and a friendly, direct tone of voice, our house style enables us to communicate accurately and effectively. It is part of the Corporate Identity standards and 'must be used in all external publications and electronic materials'.This section explains what we mean by house style and includes the most common areas where web writers have asked for guidance. A full list of these rulings can be found in the Style Guide.

WHAT IS HOUSE STYLE?
The guide states that 'Our house style does not seek to enforce a uniformed style of writing, nor will application of the rulings impinge on anyone's creative writing skills. It is merely a set of conventions involving specific areas of English, such as spellings, abbreviation, capitalisation and punctuation, where there are permissable variants in usage. For example, there is nothing wrong with using double quotation marks around quoted speech, but our preference is to use single marks.' Essentially, our house style is friendly, plain English.

ONLINE HOUSE STYLE
Our house style is the same, whatever our medium. However, our online audience is much larger and less easy to target. Therefore, we have some additional conventions, and a greater need for simplicity. Online, we write with the assumption that our audience reading age is 8 to twelve (therefore: basic vocabulary, simple structures, clear layout, logical and well-defined units of thought). This is how we try to ensure we are offering an accessible site. This does not mean we have to write as if our audience has the knowledge or intellectual experience of a school student. A complex thought or arresting idea can be well expressed with short words and sentences, and basic structures. We are merely choosing the level of reading English that is likely to include the most.

WHY WE NEED A HOUSE STYLE
The guide also explains our reason for a house style: '... we recognise that adopting this unified approach to such areas of English helps us promote a professional image of ourselves that has authority, rationality and consistency.'

CONVENTIONS FOR WEB TITLES AND SUBTITLES
Use simple, descriptive titles that summarise the content of each paragraph, e.g. What is an IELTS exam? and How to get involved. Avoid over-generalised and vague statements; puns; catchphrases; business jargon; academic terminology; superlatives; and double meaning. For example, avoid titles such as Future-proofing your career; Be the best; and Take the train. Alternatives to these could be Develop your career with an international qualification; Improve your management skills and Why not train with us?

Although puns, catchphrases and jargon are used by journalists and advertising copywriters to engage with particular audiences, they can easily confuse anyone who doesn't have much experience with the English language.

Sometimes, we can be more playful with language because we need to attract our audience, keep their attention and make our communication memorable. If we want to write in a promotional, persuasive style, we need to think creatively, so that our writing will connect with our audience and influence them appropriately. See the Persuasive writing section for more information on this.

CONVENTIONS FOR CLEAR, DIRECT WRITING
British Council websites have now been designed to help customers reach the information they need or want, as quickly and directly as possible. Using these new page layouts, customers are introduced to our offers by very short paragraphs that appear in lozenges. Each of these lozenges has a title bar, an image (in most cases) and three to six screen lines of text.

To create an offer for these lozenges, we need to use the text we have already written for the destination page; we can use the introduction or first paragraph for this (see Writing lozenge copy for advice). Alternatively, we can use this simple sentence template (fill in the blanks according to customer and service): If you are/if you want ... we can help you ... with ...

GRAMMAR AND PRESENTATION STANDARDS
Here are some common terms and words that appear on British Council sites.

1. Prefer UK (e.g. study in the UK, UK artists, teachers from the UK); rather than Great Britain, Britain, United Kingdom, or British.
2. Prefer we, our, and us; rather than formal use of the British Council, and never use the Council or BC.
3. Prefer direct, informal second person address to the customer (e.g. If you want to study in the UK ...); rather than formal, third person address (e.g. For students who want to study in the UK ...).
4. Avoid using click here; instead, turn the appropriate text into a hyperlink, e.g. visit the main Chevening website or Find out how to apply for an IELTS exam.
5. Write out telephone, fax and e-mail (or Telephone, Fax and E-mail) in full, without a colon; never use T, F, E, Tel or tel:
6. E-mail, not email.
7. Video conferencing is two words, not one.
8. Use italics for titles of books, plays, newspapers and magazines; films; and foreign words and phrases, except when appearing in an italicised section of text, where they should be displayed using standard font (so they stand out).
9. Use single quotation marks, e.g. Mr King said 'the writing course was thrilling'. Only use double quotation marks if a quote appears within a quote, e.g. 'Mr King said "the writing course was thrilling".' Avoid quotation marks for questionable meanings, e.g.'Mr King was 'thrilled' with the course. Prefer clear, sincere language: Mr King was unhappy with the course.
10. Use the 24 hour clock, presented as: 0700, 1200, 1945, etc.
11. Use -ise not -ize, e.g. organise, realise, summarise.
12. Use lower case when writing about the arts, the media, the press.
13. enquiry, not inquiry.
14. dispatch, not despatch.
15. worldwide, multimedia, online, wordprocessing and website are all single words.
16. Do not use apostrophes in decades or ages, e.g. use 1950s, and he was in his 50s, not 1950's and he was in his 50's.
17. Spell out numbers up to ten. For 11 and above, write as figures. If writing a range of numbers, maintain this rule, e.g. nine to 15.
18. Avoid unqualified adjectives and superlatives, e.g. amazing, dazzling, the best.
19. Avoid jargon and business-speak, e.g. learning curve, blue sky thinking, end of play, bottom line, up to speed.
20. Avoid overused phrases and clichés, e.g. proactive, cutting edge, key, at the end of the day.
21. Avoid unnecessary references to state, e.g. in existence, existing; and time, e.g. currently.

For more detailed advice on grammar, visit our Grammar glossary and section on English usage.