Composing a main message
Once you have established your purpose and identified your readers, you will have a good idea of what you need to communicate to your specific audience. We refer to the single most comprehensive idea that you want to communicate as your main message. Writing this main message is a pivotal step in the prewriting process. With your main message, you express in only one or two sentences the central idea of your document. This applies to any type of writing from basic emails to complex reports. By establishing a clear main message, you have created for yourself a reference point for your entire document.
You can use your main message to guide your document in two important ways: