Improve Your Business Writing
By Adelaide Kwaning
Whether you are offline or online, business writing is a skill that is useful for all writers. A number of writers focus a lot on their articles, books, poems and other written documents but never bother to learn how to communicate in the business world. It is the easiest way to chuck money out the window. The excuse is “I’m a writer, an artist, I don’t need to know how to write in the business world.” This attitude is why many writers don’t make the money they are capable of. Their pieces are phenomenal but they don’t know how to properly promote themselves. Writing is a business. If you are going to use your words to build a career or use it as a form of marketing then you should know some basic business writing tips.
For starts writing for business is not the same as writing your three part novel. You want all your sentences to be as short and concise as possible. If it looks like a fragment you’re on the right track.
The surest way to draw out a sentence is to use adjectives and adverbs. These types of words should be eliminated from your sentences. The main reason is because they often make claims rather than report facts. The last thing you want to do is to have a potential client roll their eyes. Stick to simple verbs and nouns.
You now know that lengthy sentences should be avoided, so naturally long paragraphs are out too. You should have just one topic for each paragraph. Don’t try to incorporate an array of new ideas. If your idea is a little off topic start a new paragraph. It’s better to have 10 small focused paragraphs than 3 large undirected ones. You also want to cut unnecessary words.
Using only necessary words is a must for any type of writing, but it’s even more important in business. Saying something like “advanced planning” means “planning” so use the simpler version. As I stated before do not load adjectives and adverbs into your document.
As well you want to avoid jargon. If the reader doesn’t understand you they will not want to read on. Stick to the subject-verb-object as the base of every sentence. And keep all your sentences active.
Passive voice weakens your sentences. Use active voice, it is not only easier to read, but it is more direct.
Remember that with any type of writing consistency is important. Keep all your tenses consistent. If you are going to switch tenses you should have a reason. I recommend using present tense. Consistency applies to languages too.
If you started your piece in English, keep it in English. Don’t through random phrases in foreign languages just to be clever. You may speak three different languages but you should only write in one.
Of course you want to avoid clichés. It’s not always easy, especially for many writers but they don’t make you sound professional.
Writers shouldn’t shy away from business writing. Knowing how to communicate in a professional manner can do wonders for your career. Above are some simple tricks you can use to improve your business writing today.
Website: http://writeprofits.blogspot.com
About the Author
Adelaide Kwaning is an author and business professional. Here website http://writeprofits.blogspot.com offers tips for online writers. If you would like to learn some more business writing techniques to further your writing career visit http://writeprofits.blogspot.com/2007/03/business-writing-tips.html