How Axios HQ’s ‘Smart Brevity’ System Makes Writing And Communicating More Accessible To Everyone

Published by Forbes on September 13, 2024

Roy Schwartz told me something really revealing in a recent interview. He said when building Axios alongside co-founders Mike Allen and Jim VandeHei, the trio discovered a piece of data that showed 80% of people who read the news quit after 350 words. The men had a decade’s worth of data that showed the trend line “only getting worse,” according to Schwartz, leading them to the conclusion that readers’ attention spans were shrinking. The problem with that is obvious: given the ubiquity and power of the modern internet, information is constantly pushed out into the world by Axios reporters and those at other newsrooms. Schwartz and team saw the proverbial silver lining within the dark cloud, seizing an opportunity to build a new type of media outfit that would prioritize brevity without skimping on substance. It was a win-win situation.

Axios would launch in 2016 under the auspices of Allen and VandeHei’s experience building political news site Politico, with Schwartz telling me a cornerstone of Axios being something the trio called Smart Brevity. Look at any story on Axios’ website today and you’ll find no impenetrable wall of text. Instead, the company focuses on delivering to readers what essentially are bite-sized chunks of information. Much in the same vein to how task analyses separate tasks into individual components, Axios’ presentation is predicated on the idea of telling readers what’s happening, why it’s important, and how it affects others. All told, Axios does quality journalism featuring in-depth reporting—but packages the story is such a way that it’s easily digestible for readers. To Schwartz’s point, the format—which has been copied by legacy stalwarts like the New York Times—enables people to stay engaged with a story and retain attentiveness by feeding them information matter-of-factly.

It wasn’t long before Schwartz and team began to contemplate how their Smart Brevity brainchild could have other applicability. What they discovered, he told me, is people internally at Axios were clamoring for it as part of a desire to streamline communications between employees. That feedback led to the creation of an offshoot called Axios HQ, of which Schwartz serves as chief executive officer. On its website, Axios HQ touts itself as “an AI-powered communication software—rooted in years of research around reader behavior—that keeps staff and stakeholders better informed.” Axios HQ boasts its updates, which leverage OpenAI’s GPT–4, are on average 40% shorter than traditional workplace communications, all the while retaining “all the critical detail and sophisticated nuance your audience needs.” That’s Smart Brevity in a nutshell. It’s short and sweet in a way Sgt. Joe Friday would adore.

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