Content Is King

Operational excellence

2009-09-25T04:19:00.000-07:00

Here’s a true story. The boss of a big company decided the company’s major internal comms message of the year was going to be “Operational Excellence”.

So every day “Operational Excellence” were the first words employees saw when they walked into the canteen; employees got e-mails explaining how their team’s operational excellence would be measured, and their manager told them they’d be focusing on how operationally excellent they personally were.

But six months later, when the results were measured, had anyone done anything about it? Of course not.

Oh, except for one team. One team where all the scores had gone up. A team that really had become operationally excellent. What had the manager of that team done differently to succeed where no-one else had?

He’d run a weekly meeting on the subject, just like the other managers, except he’d changed the name of the meeting from “Operational Excellence”, to “Doing Everyday Things, Better”.

Thanks to Neil Taylor at The Writer

Start from the end

2009-09-22T02:50:00.001-07:00

The more you read something, the more your brain begins to memorise it. If you re-read a document over and over, eventually your brain knows what’s coming next, so you’re not actually reading the piece anymore, you’re just scanning it.

When you feel you’ve read your copy too many times, help your brain by mixing things up. Read the last sentence first and check for things like sentence structure and grammar. Then read the sentence above the last and do the same. Pull lines out of the copy at random and check for errors. By treating each sentence this way, your brain will break out of scanning mode and you’ll read your copy with a sharper eye.

Leave the office

2009-09-18T04:43:00.001-07:00

You’ll never be a great writer of anything if you stare at your desk.

Look at people. Get outside and observe. It’s surprising what you might learn.

For example, did you know Black and Decker don’t sell drills, they sells holes? And deodorants aren’t about keeping dry, they’re about being loved. Computers aren’t about getting more work done, they’re about power. Cars aren’t about transportation, they’re about success. Food isn’t about hunger. Drink isn’t about thirst.

And these days money isn’t the most precious commodity; time is.

Before you open up Microsoft word and start the process of writing, go take a walk.

Outside you see things differently.

Reading out loud

2009-09-07T04:16:00.000-07:00

Reading your words out aloud is a great tip for a writer. It helps you check how clear the sentences are and how well the copy flows. Sometimes it is almost impossible to catch some poorly written phrases or sentences without first testing them on the ear. In fact, you may not realise how complicated a sentence is until you’ve read it out aloud.

Hearing the piece also gives you a fresh take on the copy you’ve written. You can be more subjective and hear the words you’ve actually written on the page, rather than those you think are there.

Finally, reading a piece out loud helps you figure out where there may be holes in the piece, where your wording may become a bit cliche’, where transitions falter or where information needs to be broken up and possibly bullet pointed.

Legalese

2009-08-14T07:09:00.001-07:00

Back in the 1800’s, legalese was the most favoured writing style for business. The Victorians thought penmanship was a solemn art and those that created stuffy and erudite commentaries were in high demand.

Look around and you’ll find a lot of overformal writing is still with us today. This passage, excerpted from the Ohio Traffic Code, is an example of how convoluted, wordy and formal writing can lead to confusion rather than clarity.

"No vehicle shall be turned so as to proceed in the opposite direction within an intersection, or upon any street in a business district, or upon a freeway, expressway or controlled-access highway, or where authorized signs are erected to prohibit such movement, or at any other location unless such movement can be made with reasonable safety to other users of the street and without interfering with the safe operation of any traffic that may be affected by such movement."

Thus, if you have a tendency to write like a solicitor from Surrey and you think stiff and archaic copy commands respect and elevates your writing – please re-read the aforementioned text.

The exclamation mark

2009-08-11T06:08:00.000-07:00

Today, the exclamation mark has become so common in e-mail, texts, Facebook and 140-character Twitter communications that it’s almost being used as a word in its own right.

Fowler's Modern English Usage puts it like this: "Except in poetry the exclamation mark should be used sparingly. Excessive use of exclamation marks in expository prose is a sure sign of an unpractised writer or of one who wants to add a spurious dash of sensation to something unsensational."

Times have changed and with the arrival of email these days the liberal use of the screamer is commonplace. In fact some argue that exclamation marks are not just marks of excitability, but of friendliness. Thanks!!!!'", they contend, "is way friendlier than 'Thanks'."

Lynn Truss in her book ‘Eats, Shoots and Leaves’ says: "I do think people are generally trying to get expression into email - and exclamation marks are good for getting attention."

Well, here at Avvio we resist the temptation to puff-up our wordage with the liberal use of exclamation marks. If the copy requires an exclamation to give it emphasis, we’d say it’s simply not good enough in the first place.

And if you use it all the time your reader will soon realise you don't have anything to exclaim.

Some advice on writing from George Orwell

2009-07-27T06:32:00.000-07:00

Rhythm

2009-07-14T02:32:00.000-07:00

Writing effective copy is a lot more than throwing a bunch of sentences together. It’s about structure, it’s about pace, and it’s about rhythm.

In music, rhythm is the steady beat that takes the listener from start to finish. In writing however, rhythm is the opposite of a steady beat. It’s a variety of sentence lengths from short to long, from medium to very short. Sometimes very short sentences indeed.

By altering the length of your sentences you stop the copy flow from becoming boring. And even though Microsoft Word doesn’t approve, go ahead and fragment a sentence if it helps you create that all-important chatty and conversational tone.

Wait a minute! Isn’t this different to the way you were taught to write at school?

Yes.

But don’t worry, if someone questions the copious amounts of full stops in your copy just point them to The Economist Style Guide where they say this about punctuation: Use plenty. Keep sentences short. This helps the reader.

How The Church can help you with your PowerPoint presentations

2009-07-09T08:50:00.000-07:00

The business world is full of rubbish PowerPoint presentations. One of the reasons they are so dire is that writers forget one important factor: people can only concentrate on one big idea for a maximum of twenty minutes.

The Church has known this for a long time; most sermons usually last no more than twenty minutes. And men of the cloth also know that if they should send their audience to sleep or overload them with too much information, churchgoers will be heading for pastures new.

So before you start writing your presentation make sure you know what your big idea is. Then present it, illustrate it, compare it, and lastly repeat it.

Also remember the 10/20/30 Rule of PowerPoint. It’s quite simple; a PowerPoint presentation should have ten slides, last no more than twenty minutes, and contain no font smaller than thirty points.

Abide by this rule and your presentation will be understandable, memorable and successful. And you can be sure your audience will say amen to that.

Purple prose

2009-07-06T08:43:00.000-07:00

Often found in romantic novels and estate agents property descriptions, purple prose is a kind of supercharged writing where the text becomes extravagant, overstylised or flowery in the extreme.

An overuse of metaphors, clichés, similes, and adjectives along with a complex sentence structure and a turn of phrase such as 'rosy fingers of dawn' would qualify as examples of the genre.

In the copywriters style guide, fussy words and fancy expressions are usually avoided. The goal is not to sound intelligent, but to get your intelligent point across.

Who actually reads your corporate communications?

2009-07-02T09:08:00.000-07:00

Most business writing doesn’t achieve what it’s supposed to achieve. The reason for this is simple – no one reads business writing. And the reason nobody reads business writing is basically because it is boring.

Try as you might, you can’t make your work mates read your 1000-word essay on 'Implementing the new Strategy in Offshore Markets'. They’ll only read what grabs them, draws them in, and interests them.

So you have to find an engaging way of telling the story.

You also need to remember that people are busy. So keep your copy short and use sub headings to help them skim read.

It also helps if you try and develop a distinctive voice that’s chatty and conversational. Not formal and rigid

And don’t alienate people with the long words. Or turn them off with the clichéd phrases.

In short, do whatever you can to keep your reader awake.

How poor writing impacts on your business

2009-06-30T02:48:00.001-07:00

We read recently that poor writing is costing the electronics industry a small fortune. It seems in some cases badly translated user guides are responsible for somewhere around 30% of products being returned. Which is unbelievably high.

This got us thinking. So we started looking for other instances where poor writing can be seen to impact on a businesses bottom line. And we found a few revealing facts.

In Canada, poor writing is slowing down the pace of business. According to a recent survey 85% of respondents said that disorganised, cluttered sentences, bad grammar and business jargon often got in the way of them understanding the message and simply wasted their time.

Badly written letters lose UK businesses an estimated £6 billion a year. In the United States, it has been said that an estimated 30% of all business writing is to clarify or seek clarification of something already written.

Employers are also losing out on great ideas because employees cannot articulate them in writing. In one such case an oil company spent hundreds of thousands of dollars developing a new pesticide... only to discover that the formula had already been worked out five years earlier – by one of the same company's technicians. He’d written his report so poorly that no one had finished reading it.

Most businesses however have no idea how much time and money they spend on writing. Managers, directors, and other highly paid workers can spend up to 85 % of their time writing, yet very few have received any kind of writing training.

Most damaging of all, poorly written documents cause employees to miscommunicate with their customers. And when a business is represented poorly in its written communications then everything else is questioned; “If they don’t care about their writing, then how competent is their customer service and their products?”

Put yourself in their shoes

2009-06-26T04:04:00.000-07:00

Almost all business writing is about persuading the reader to do something. An internal document that explains the new company strategy, the brochure that welcomes new starters to the business, even your own CV – they're all written to influence somebody’s opinion and behavior.

And persuasion is a subtle art. Make your point too strongly and all you’ll do is send alarm bells ringing in people’s minds, they might even feel you’re trying to manipulate and control them.

To write persuasive copy effectively, try putting yourself in the reader's shoes and introduce some empathy into your words. As you write, pretend that your reader is a friend or family member. Start by writing something they can relate to and agree with. Empathy also helps you convince your reader that what you write is true.

Writing on the walls at Vodafone

2009-06-24T07:48:00.000-07:00

Here's an example of some of the work we've been writing for the Vodafone brand. Our brief was to try and bring 'Make the Most of Now' to life and we used their office walls to tell the story.

We've produced a whole range of different ideas and there's more pictures of our work here

How to write a headline

2009-06-24T07:21:00.000-07:00

As a copywriter, the half a dozen or so words you use to create your headline are probably the most important you will write. Why? Well, the headline is the first thing your audience will see – so the 10 seconds it takes to glance at the headline is the deciding factor whether they will read your copy or not. And nothing distinguishes a professional writer from an amateur so quickly as the quality of the headlines. So headline writing is a very important part of the job and here are some general guidelines to help you.

The News Headline. Well-written news headlines distil the essence of the story. They grab the attention and contain strong, active verbs and short, simple words. The headline needs to be constructed in such a way that the reader is intrigued by the story and wants to read on.

The How to Headline. The premise of this type of headline is that you are going to teach someone how to do something. You can make it even more appealing by using a structure that starts with a ‘how’ and followed by ‘that’. For example; ‘How to Choose A Copywriter That Can Write an Effective Headline’.

The Question Headline. For this to work it must be a question that your audience would really like to see answered. For example: ‘Ever wished you could have £1,000 worth of baby products for free?”

The Catchy headline. This is a simple technique to grab the reader’s attention. It should do so appropriately and honestly - if the headline is oversold, the reader will feel cheated.

The Benefit headline. The benefit headline is often found in advertising and will tell the reader what he will get out of buying the product. For example; become smarter, stronger, better looking, more informed?

Writing in the second person

2009-06-18T03:42:00.000-07:00

Hi, how are you? Well, it’s good to see you. Guess you're here looking for some interesting insight into great business writing? Well, we thought today we'd have a quick chat about writing in the second person. How’s that sound?

That sentence above isn't just a warm and cuddly introduction, it's a perfect example of writing in the second person. It more informal. It's more conversational. It's also more involving because it feels like the writer is talking to you directly.

A couple of decades ago, no business writer would dream of addressing his colleagues through the second person. The approach would have been considered way too forward. Back in those days the writer would hide behind formal, stuffy third-person language such as ‘this will be implemented in June’ and use Dickensian terms such as ‘herewith' and 'amongst'.

Thankfully things are changing and many companies are now modernising their communications by writing in the second person.

Here at Avvio we often use an active second person voice for much of our business writing. As well as being a more powerful writing style, we’ve found that it helps the writer concentrate on what the reader needs to know rather than simply writing what we want to say.

The art of saying a great deal in as few words as possible

2009-06-17T02:13:00.000-07:00

Why take twenty words to say what you could say in five? Like it or not, time is one of the most precious commodities for business people and finding ways to communicate to them using no more than a handful of words is an important skill.

So no matter what we are writing, we keep the message simple.

We write in ‘spoken’ rather than ‘written’ English.

We avoid any verbal gymnastics because fancy long words often obscure the communication, and we think the message should be the star, not the writer.

Lastly, we craft the copy in a way that each sentence leads onto the next so effortlessly that you’re powerless to do anything other than read to the end.

Ernest Hemingway, pictured above, once wrote a story in just six words ('For sale: baby shoes, never worn.') and is said to have called it his best work.

Can we do it? You bet we can!

2009-06-16T08:05:00.000-07:00

Here at Avvio we work on all kinds of projects, from naming and tone of voice, to ads and video scripts. In fact, over the years there's very little business writing or corporate communications that we haven't been involved in.

The benefit of all this experience is you can work with very versatile writers who understand the requirements of all the different media we have today. Writers who can put the maximum into your project and help you achieve top results. This includes:

naming.
tone of voice.
blogging.
scriptwriting
advertising.
online.
internal comms.
brand books.
editorial features.
press releases.

Obviously, if you're looking for a writer for any of these kind of projects, we'd be love to be involved. Just drop a line to: john.fountain@avvio.co.uk and let's talk it over.