Writing Advice Archives - Page 8 of 12

A THREE-STEP PROCESS FOR SHARPER COPY

March 21, 2012 by Scott Flood

Worried that what you’ve written sounds a little too light and fluffy? Concerned that your words seem to be traveling all over the place instead of delivering a clear message? Thanks to a handy tool within Microsoft Word and most other word processors, and with a little bit of self-discipline, you can easily make your writing tighter and more powerful.

That handy tool is the Word Count indicator. In my current version of Word, it’s located at the lower left-hand side of the screen, right next to the page number. And here’s how you can use it to improve your writing: highlight whatever it is that you’re writing, whether that’s a page or a paragraph. The word count indicator gives you the total number of words.

SAVE YOUR BEST WORK FOR EDITING

July 27, 2011 by Scott Flood

One of the surest signs of a professional writer is that his or her first drafts are absolutely terrible and often unreadable.

Surprised? It’s true. While most non-writers assume that those of us who earn a living stringing words together try to create brilliance and beauty with every keystroke, the simple fact is that our real skill emerges in the rewrite stage.

DEATH TO THE AMPERSAND!

April 6, 2011 by Scott Flood

No, I’m not advocating violence against punctuation. And I’ll admit that the ampersand (that little “&” mark) can be handy now and then. But it’s one of the most-misused tools in the punctuation toolbox.

The ampersand serves as a graphic replacement for the word “and.” When used in graphic design, it can even be a thing of beauty — much prettier than those three letters it replaces. Designers will twist and turn ampersands, run words through and around them, or present them in different colors and typefaces.

WHAT COLOR IS YOUR PAGE?

February 9, 2011 by Scott Flood

Another simple way to gauge your copy’s potential effectiveness is to highlight it in two different colors. Whether you’re developing a letter, a brochure, a web page, or any other channel, take a few moments to highlight all of the sentences that are really about your customer and his or her needs. Let’s do that in pink. Next, highlight all the sentences that are about your company and what it does in yellow.

Now look at the page. What color is your page?

A QUICK TEST FOR YOUR COPY’S EFFECTIVENESS

December 29, 2010 by Scott Flood

Wonder how well your next ad, website, or brochure will communicate with your readers? Here’s a simple test that’s remarkably powerful.

Count the number of times that your company’s name appears in the text. Then count the number of times words “we,” “us,” and “our” appear in there, and add it to your first number.

DO YOU CRAVE FAME OR NOTORIETY?

December 1, 2010 by Scott Flood

There are many words that have been misused so often that their meanings have started to blur – and writers who should know better have used the wrong words in the wrong places.

For example, I recently read an article in a national magazine claiming that a particular musician had earned his notoriety by producing a couple albums. “Notoriety” was the wrong word – unless those albums were downright horrible.

HOW CAN YOU INVOLVE READERS?

November 24, 2010 by Scott Flood

Looking for a way to catch the attention of your audience and focus their full attention on your message? Instead of telling them what you want to hear, ask them a question that matters to them.

You may have heard that asking questions in headlines and opening statements is a bad idea. For example, I once had a boss who became furious anytime I presented an ad or brochure with a question in the headline. His reasoning is that the reader might give the wrong answer and lose interest.

GARBAGE IN …

November 4, 2010 by Scott Flood

Back when computers were the size of your garage, programmers often summarized a particular situation as “garbage in, garbage out.” It normally referred to either bad data or bad instructions that, when fed into a computer, led to worse results. For example, if the programmer’s client didn’t provide a precise description of the program’s objectives, the result might not be what was expected. Or, if the data being fed in was inaccurate, the results could be even worse.

The same comment applies to writing. No matter how much talent a writer may have, the results he or she will be able to produce are entirely dependent on the quality of information that’s available. If a client can’t express the objectives or parameters, there’s a good chance that what the writer does won’t meet expectations.

WRITE SOMETHING, ANYTHING

July 8, 2010 by Scott Flood

One of the most common frustrations about writing is the inability to get started. Whether someone has to write something for work, for school, or for any other purpose, nine times out of ten, their struggle begins with the first words they need to put on the page.

Some people call it writer’s block, although most people who write seriously will tell you that block is an entirely different animal. Fortunately, this complaint is easier to address than real block.

MORE COVERAGE ON COVER LETTERS

June 15, 2010 by Scott Flood

I’ve written before on the importance of cover letters, and how experience on both sides of the job-seeking process convinced me that they’re far more important than resumes.

I’m not alone. In the June issue of Inc. Magazine, columnist Jason Fried, founder of a software firm, said that his firm doesn’t even bother looking at resumes. Instead, they read the cover letters.