5 Tips for Sound Business Writing
Though far more common in some types of business than others, nearly every industry carries with it a writing component. Think of all the writing your company typically encounters or produces during the course of a year: promotional material, procedural manuals, physical signage, proposals, Web pages, sales letters, applicant forms, planning documents...writing appears in so many facets of business.
But is it good writing? The image your business projects in its writing can be the difference between landing a deal and losing one. Customers can be turned off by poorly-worded promotions. Employees may misinterpret policies that are not clearly written. Avoid the repercussions of poor business writing by establishing these habits in your company.
1) Be conscious of the tone of your words.
Different documents call for different writing styles; determine what style is appropriate, when. Effective business writing must be a good fit for its audience. Imagine, for example, applying the bubbly, enthusiastic wording of a sales letter to a partnership proposal. The result is decidedly unprofessional.
The opposite tone mismatch is equally ineffective. In an effort to sound sure and authoritative, one may unintentionally come across as arrogant. One easy way to take a cold or condescending edge out of a document is to eliminate cluttered, flowery language. For example, if "use" will work just as well as "utilize," consider making the substitution. Or try saying "due before next Friday's meeting" instead of "to be submitted prior to the team planning session scheduled for Friday, February 8, 2008."
2) Avoid industry jargon when communicating with outsiders.
In documents circulated among fellow professionals, the language of your trade is the norm. But if your document is intended to reach an outside audience, use everyday terms and, where necessary, definitions instead of jargon that outsiders may find obscure or misleading.
3) Update materials regularly.
Make a habit of regularly perusing the documents you use to maintain and promote your business. Schedule these reviews at least quarterly for large documents like company policy manuals or business plans. Less static, shorter, or more frequently disbursed documents can be evaluated more frequently.
During your evaluation, be sure to cover two major review categories: content and presentation. Content review deals with facts and message. Examples of content changes:
* deleting employee guidelines that are no longer enforced
* updating names and titles of board members
* clarifying a hiring policy
* creating a description of a new product
* adding a field for e-mail address on an employment application form
Presentation review checks for surface features that make an impression because they quickly attract (or detract) attention. Examples of presentation changes:
* replacing an old logo with a new one
* switching to a new font that matches all other documents
* updating the copyright year on Web pages
* replacing outmoded wording with new terminology
While reviewing documents may be a time-consuming task, it also goes a long way toward achieving foremost positioning for your business.
4) Adopt a stylebook, and learn and apply its standards.
Some industries have a preferred stylebook. Others have created their own internal standards; these may include, for example, special rules for capitalization or memo formatting. Still other industries have no preference. If your business happens to fall into one of those industries, don't make the mistake of assuming standards don't matter. Consistency is the key. Whichever guidelines you create or adopt, apply them without fail. This gives a sense of reliability, steadiness, and stability to all your professional documents.
5) Always proofread with a fresh eye.
It goes without saying that business writing needs to be proofread. But even if you're a master of grammar and spelling, don't assume that your weary eye will notice errors after you've spent significant time laboring over a document. You need to see the document with a fresh eye--that is, as a first-time reader will see it. Sometimes this means simply setting a piece of writing aside for a day to let your mind rest before attempting to polishing it. For very long or complex documents, it is advisable to ask an uninvolved, unbiased reader to proofread instead.
Take a little time to read the words your business uses, not lightly, but with a critical eye. Seek out and revise areas that may be confusing to a potential customer or employee. Experiment with fresh new wording. Eliminate overused phrases. Doggedly pursue typos and other spelling errors. With the exception of those rare flashes of genius, believable, effective business writing does not appear magically. But it is certainly achievable, and the payoff in professionalism, reputation, and even profits makes it well worth the effort.
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Please include author's bio and add active links if you republish:
AnnaLisa Michalski writes and publishes the ezine Word-wise and owns and operates Admin Maven, a virtual assisting service specializing in proofreading and copy editing.
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