Councils across the country are getting their wrists slapped for using the wrong words.

Well, they aren’t exactly wrong, but if you can tell me what “goldfish bowl facilitated conversation” is then I’ll eat my hat-shaped chocolate items.

Jargon can sometimes be a really useful tool, so that people in your company or industry know exactly what they’re talking about. Sometimes jargon is just empty gibberish that could easily be replaced by normal human phrases.

Either way, the last thing you should ever do is inflict jargon on the public. At best they’ll be unimpressed, at worst they’ll be confused, and confused visitors won’t hang around on your site to find out what you mean, they’ll click back to Google and find a company that speaks plain English.

Of course, it’s harder to find yourself a new local council, so it’s easier for them to get away with it.