What is an Introduction?

Introduction is an opening paragraph of an essay or research paper. It gives an idea about the title or the focus of a piece of writing. It should be designed in an attractive manner in order to grab the attention of the readers.

Introduction is an important section of an essay or a paper but writing an introduction does not involve any specified rule or a general formula. Here is a brief guideline on how to make an introduction more appealing for your readers.
A Guide to Grab the Attention of the Readers
First Sentence that Sizzles

Most often, magazine articles or newspaper columns are written in this manner. The first sentence or sentences of an introduction should be attractive enough to capture the attention of the readers. You can start an introduction with a quotation or thought provoking ideas about the subject. This raises the level of curiosity in the readers and you can easily pull them in.
Clear the Central Idea of the Paper

Introduction should be written in a way that it clearly depicts the central idea of the paper. After going through this section, readers should not have any doubt about the main idea of the paper.
Establish the Importance of the Topic

To take complete hold on the readers, you should also highlight the importance of the topic in an introduction. Constructing a successful introduction, you should tell the significance of the topic.
Introduction is a Preview of the Thesis Statement

Introduction is, basically, used to prepare the readers for further discussion and analysis as enclosed in the later parts of the essay. It also gives the recognition of the thesis statement.
Some More Tips for Writing Introductions

Here are some common mistakes that are most often made by young scholars or researchers while writing an introduction. These are briefly mentioned here,

An introduction should not introduce the detailed background of the topic. However, a brief description can be enclosed for readers’ recognition to the topic or thesis statement.
It is preferable to write an introduction that offers the significance of the topic in order to grab the attention of the readers. Introductory paragraphs should never be too long. Half page paragraph or little more than that can be enough for quality writing.
It is also a wise option to start an introduction with your own remarks instead of a standard dictionary definition.
Grand generalization should also be prohibited in the first section of your paper. Basically, grand generalizations give rise to irrelevant, unnecessary and uninterested details which add poor quality to any essay or research paper.

Although there is no rigid formula for writing a good introduction but we can see that there are several tips and guidelines we can easily adopt to produce quality results. We can easily go through introduction examples that are available online and offline.

Author's Bio: 

Nadia Ansari has posted this article. Visit writing tips to read more about introductions writing.