On 10 September 2026, arguably one of the world’s most famous surviving pieces of medieval art will go on display at the British Museum after a 1,000-year stint in France.
The Bayeux Tapestry stretches for approximately 70 metres and tells the story of the events leading up to the Norman Conquest and the Battle of Hastings.
Yet the main story is only part of the fascination. Across 58 scenes, hundreds of people and animals appear alongside small details about life at the time that historians are still picking apart to this day.
This amount of detail is what makes the Tapestry so fascinating. The closer you look, the more there is to spot – much like a vast and very old Where’s Wally? book.
Your latest blog or social media post likely has a slightly different job, though.
When you know a subject inside out, it can be tempting to embroider every point with another fact or caveat.
After all, if something feels useful and you have the expertise to explain it, leaving it out might seem counterintuitive.
However, your readers probably didn’t arrive on your website or LinkedIn page intending to study your content like a historian examining 70 metres of medieval embroidery. More often than not, they simply want the answer to a particular question.
So, while the Bayeux Tapestry has earned the right to sprawl, your content might be stronger if you know when to stop stitching.
Continue reading to discover why knowing what to leave out can be just as important as knowing what to put in.
Too much information could obscure the point you’re trying to make
Financial planning is such a broad and technical subject that you’ll likely always find more information to include.
Imagine, for instance, you’re writing an article titled “3 important factors to consider before drawing from your pension”.
You may feel the best course of action is to discuss how much income clients need. Then, you may move into tax on withdrawals, investment risk, annuities, drawdown, and the State Pension.
Each of these topics could be relevant and genuinely useful. However, the problem comes when they start to crowd the three points you originally set out to explain.
If you clearly define the three considerations, why they matter, and what the reader may need to think about next, you’ve already delivered on the promise made in your headline.
While more loosely related topics might make your article feel more detailed, they can easily bury the main message.
Unlike the Bayeux Tapestry, where examining the smallest characters and scenes is part of the appeal, your reader is unlikely to want to spend hours going through every thread.
More often than not, they simply want to leave with an answer to the question that brought them there.
Of course, leaving information out doesn’t mean oversimplifying the subject or removing details your reader genuinely needs.
A balance is required, and it’s vital to separate information that helps carry arguments from information that is just related to them.
If a detail improves understanding or accuracy, it might deserve to stay. If it simply proves how much you know, it may be better to remove it.
3 practical ways to stop your content becoming a 70-metre epic
Knowing that you should leave some information out is only half the battle. Deciding which parts to remove can be just as challenging.
Here are three practical ways to separate useful detail from information that is simply weighing your piece down.
- Use your headline as a filter
Your headline essentially makes a promise to the reader, so it can be a simple way to decide what stays.
If you’re writing “5 ways to prepare for retirement”, each section should help you deliver on those five points.
Some background detail will, of course, be needed, but the further you drift from the title, the more likely you are to lose the reader along the way.
If you’re unsure about a paragraph, you might want to try removing it temporarily and reading the article again.
If the main argument still stands without it, there’s a good chance the extra detail wasn’t as essential as you previously thought.
- Watch for explanations that create three more
When writing, you might find that a single technical explanation opens the door to several more.
For example, you might introduce a pension rule that needs defining. This definition could raise a tax question, which needs its own explanation.
Before long, even a tightly focused article has developed an entirely new branch.
The information might still be relevant, but you may have reached the point where the article tries to answer more than one question at once.
If describing a new concept requires several paragraphs of additional information, it might be prudent to ask yourself whether the reader realistically needs it here.
- Turn what you cut into your next idea
Removing a section can understandably feel wasteful, especially if you’ve already spent some time researching it. Thankfully, cut sections don’t have to disappear for good.
A paragraph on investment risk that feels forced into a retirement article could become the basis for another blog post.
Or, a useful tax example might work better in a newsletter, while a short explanation you remove for length could become a social media post.
We could help you decide what makes the cut
The Bayeux Tapestry has good reason to stretch for 70 metres. Its scale and detail are part of what makes it such an incredible record of the past.
Your latest piece of content, however, has a narrower purpose. Even so, deciding what deserves a place can be surprisingly difficult when you know your subject inside out.
If you’ve spent years building your expertise, it’s only natural to want to give readers the best picture possible.
This is where an outside perspective can help.
At the Yardstick Agency, we’ve spent years working with financial professionals to turn complicated ideas into engaging content.
Our team can identify which topics are worth pursuing, which details deserve space, and which might be better saved for another day.
If you’d like some help deciding what belongs in the final stitch of your firm’s tapestry, email hi@theyardstickagency.co.uk or call 0115 8965 300.
