By Jacob Parkin
In the contemporary world, where effective communication is important, mastering the art of persuasive writing becomes essential. Persuasive writing is a written oral debate which aims to persuade the readers with the writer’s opinion. In the academic realm, teachers assign persuasive essays to students to practice this art.
However, many students find themselves in hot water when they sit to write this essay. According to a report by Digital Promise, 50% of students are unable to write an essay because they are unaware of the structure of the essay. If you are one of them, then this guide is for you.
In this article, we’ll share what a persuasive essay is, how to write a successful one, and some examples of persuasive essays. Let’s start with knowing what a persuasive essay is.
What is a Persuasive Essay?
A persuasive essay is a common essay type which is written to convince the readers about a specific viewpoint and compel them to take a particular action. This essay type is intermixed with argumentative essays, it is true that in both essays, the writer has to present logical arguments to discuss a serious issue. The major difference between them is that a persuasive essay focuses on sharing personal experience with emotional appeal, whereas an argumentative essay is only based on solid facts.
The key elements that you must add to a persuasive essay are the following:
- A thesis statement
- An introduction paragraph
- Body paragraphs
- A smooth transition between body paragraphs
- Counterclaim
- Conclusion
Adding these elements to an essay sometimes becomes an uphill battle for students as they don’t know how to structure each section. Such students hire a UK-based essay writing service that can assist them at every stage of the writing process.
How to Write a Persuasive Essay? Top 7 Secrets Revealed
In an essay based on persuasive writing, you have to try to convince the readers about the validity of your arguments. This essay follows the general structure format: introduction, body paragraph, and conclusion. However, using a gentle and understanding tone is the key to writing a successful essay.
If you are wondering how to structure this essay while keeping the tone gentle and convincing, keep reading this article. We will share key steps to writing a powerful persuasive essay.
1. Start With Topic Selection
Choosing a topic is the first step of this essay-writing process. To choose a good persuasive writing topic, you must think about the concepts or experiences that really interest you. Remember, just considering your interest is not enough, you must also think about what your readers want to read.
After picking the topic, you should do some preliminary research that will ensure that you have selected the right topic for your essay. While conducting this research, follow the tips below:
- Explore reliable sources such as books, journals, or news articles to gather authentic information about your topic.
- During this research, keep an eye on the new ideas and concepts related to your topic.
- Make sure that there is enough evidence out there to back your core idea.
Pro Tip: Make your topic flexible enough so you can broaden or shorten the essay length according to the word count limit provided by your instructor.
2. Craft a Strong Thesis Statement
A strong thesis statement is one of the key elements of successful persuasive essay writing. Therefore, this statement should be concise, specific, and clear. To ensure clarity, you have to avoid using vague ideas that may confuse your readers. Try to come up with a specific idea that will encourage readers to think more critically about your idea.
Furthermore, keep in mind the following things while writing the thesis statement for your persuasive writing.
- Ensure that you add the key evidence in your thesis that you have gathered during the research.
- Write a statement that outlines your main argument and highlights the significance of your topic.
- Use facts from experts to enhance the credibility of your arguments.
3. Make an Outline for Persuasive Essay
A persuasive writing essay outline serves as the roadmap for you while structuring this essay. The outline of this essay type follows the general outline consisting of the following key parts:
- Introduction: An introduction is like the opener of your essay, encompassing the context, which is essential for the reader’s understanding.
- Body paragraphs: This part contains the arguments to support your key idea sequentially.
- Counterarguments: Address the opposing viewpoint to convince your reader that the counterpoint is false or weak, eventually making your arguments stronger.
- Conclusion: Conclude the essay by summarising all the key points and leaving a lasting impression on your audience.
4. Write a Strong Introduction
The introduction is the first section of your essay that your readers will explore. Therefore, it is essential to write a strong introduction that grabs the readers’ attention. Below are the writing steps that you must follow to write an effective introduction of persuasive writing:
- Begin your introductory paragraph with a hook.
- State the background information to enhance the reader’s understanding.
- Address the main problem or issue that you think needs addressing.
- Add the existing data that can respond to your main problem.
- End this paragraph by explaining to your audience how you will address the problem.
5. Structure Your Essay Body
The body paragraphs are the core of the persuasive writing essay where you present your evidence to back up your argument. That means you have to craft this core element carefully. There are various body paragraphs in an essay; however, they all follow the same structure.
You can follow the steps below to structure your essay’s body paragraph.
- Start each paragraph by stating the main point or argument.
- After writing arguments, give strong evidence to back your argument.
- Explain why your evidence supports your arguments.
- Conclude your paragraph by summarising the topic sentence by keeping in mind the main idea of your essay.
6. Introduce the Counterarguments
A counterargument is the most critical part of the persuasive essay, which sets this essay type apart from others. You can follow the below strategies to write a powerful counterargument for your essay.
- If the counterclaim presents some different evidence, tell the reason why you cannot use it.
- In this case, if the refutation tries to weaken your argument, explain why it cannot disprove your arguments.
- If you find a counterargument valid to some extent, acknowledge it and explain how it is not relatable to your essay.
- If the counterclaim has a different perspective about the evidence, state why their understanding is wrong.
7. Conclude Your Essay
The conclusion is the last paragraph of your persuasive essay writing that comprises a summary of your entire essay. Make sure that in this section, you have addressed the main problem that you stated at the start of your essay. Additionally, at the end of the conclusion, you have to include a call for action and tell your readers what they can do with the information that you have provided in your essay.
We have outlined how to structure a winning persuasive writing format that will help you write your essay. But if you are still confused about writing this essay type, you can reach out to top-rated essay writing firms, which know how to structure a powerful essay to earn higher grades in your academic career.
Persuasive Writing Essay Examples
In this section, we are going to present some exceptional persuasive writing examples to help you better understand the structure and format of this essay. Check out these examples.
The first example is by Studocu, in which the writer crafted a perfect essay to persuade the students to eat breakfast daily.
The next example is by TemplateLab, in which you will explore the personal experience of a writer for the trip to Beijing.
Conclusion
Persuasive writing teaches students to express their ideas in compelling ways to persuade their readers with their viewpoints. Due to the importance of this skill, teachers advise students to write persuasive essays to polish their skills. However, most students find it hard to write a successful essay.
To help them out, we have enlisted the key steps to structure a winning persuasive essay in this article. These steps include choosing an appealing topic, developing a thesis statement, crafting an outline, writing a strong introduction, structuring the essay’s body, addressing the counterclaims, and writing an impactful conclusion. We sincerely hope this writing guide will help your essay writing journey.
Author Bio
Jacob Parkin is an expert essay writer who is passionate about writing engaging narratives to convince readers of his opinions and ideas. He aims to teach students to transform their ideas into powerful essays. For this, he writes various guides that comprise tips to improve essay writing skills.
Data and information are provided for informational purposes only, and are not intended for investment or other purposes.
