—Steve Martin

Planes, Trains and Automobiles

Storytellers and writers have a lot in common. They both need to get a point across. The best writers not only have a point, but they get to it quickly, reinforce it with examples or supporting logic, and reemphasize the point in their conclusion. In a world in which anyone with a computer and Internet connection can claim to be an author, you can make your written words stand out if you follow these tips.

1. Have a point. What are you writing about? Every piece of business writing should have an objective. If you aren’t sure what yours is, take a moment to identify it before you start putting fingers to keys.
2. Get to the point. Known in the journalism trade as “burying the lead,” writers who dilly-dally and don’t let their reader know what their piece is about risk not only confusing the reader, but losing them altogether. Don’t leave them thinking that your piece on emerging South American markets is really an anecdote about a guy from Guyana that you met on a plane, because the reader didn’t get beyond the first paragraph.
3. Says who? Reinforce your point. Today, everybody has an opinion, some of which are based in fact and some of which aren’t. Unfortunately, while “that’s the way it is” may have worked for Walter Cronkite in a simpler time, it doesn’t cut it today. If you can’t cite facts or reputable reports or quote respected sources, you’re really just flapping your digital gums.
4. So what? Why does what you have to say matter? What’s the impact on the reader or on the broader world? Give your writing context so the reader understands its importance. For example, “Mrs. O’Leary’s cow kicks over lantern in barn” has no importance. “Mrs. O’Leary’s cow kicks over lantern in barn, burns down Chicago” answers the “so what?” question quite effectively.
5. If it’s worth writing once… Advertisers claim that consumers need to hear a message as many as eight times before it connects with them. The least you can do is give yours twice. Conclude your piece with a restatement of your key themes so that the most important information resonates with the reader.

Distinguish yourself as a writer by remembering your point, getting to it, reinforcing it, contextualizing it and repeating it. And then let it go to the audience for which it is intended.

However, if not handled with tact, comedy can backfire and ruin an otherwise fine piece of writing. Writer Suzan St. Maur penned an article a few years ago on using humor in business that makes several good points. She writes that it’s easy to get humor wrong, especially when communicating over the Internet, which is often devoid of context. Sometimes, it’s the body language or the inflection that turns a tasteless joke into a tasteful one. When that human element is missing, all bets are off as to how the recipient of the message will take it.

Still, humor can be used successfully if the proper precautions are taken. St. Maur advises writers to use jokes about situations, not people. All of us can relate to certain situations—a plumbing emergency, a toothache or a speeding ticket, for example—but we may take offense at jokes aimed at ethnic groups, minorities or public figures. St. Maur goes on to say that humor is best used like a spicy condiment in business communications: sparingly, and avoided altogether if one doesn’t know the tastes of one’s audience.

There are other ways in addition to those mentioned by St. Maur to inject a little levity into one’s writing. One is to be self-deprecating. While readers may be quick to condemn an author if that author pokes fun at someone else, they may be inclined to laugh along with the author if they’re poking fun at themselves. And the ability to laugh at one’s self and point out one’s own foibles can be viewed as a sign of wisdom, humility, confidence and a certain level of comfort in one’s own skin.

Another way is quote famous and respected humorists, whose work has gained a measure of respect and acceptance in general society. For example, Mark Twain once said, “Suppose you were an idiot and suppose you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself.” A comment like that might offend if an unknown author made it, but coming from Twain, it is likely to make others smile.

Whatever approach an author uses, it’s always best to have respected co-workers (or two or three) review the piece before it goes to print. If it causes raised eyebrows in the office, it’s likely to do a lot more damage with a wider audience. As Shakespeare, himself no stranger to satire and the clever use of humor, wrote in Henry IV, “The better part of valour is discretion.” When in doubt, don’t.

How do you know if you’re a good writer or if what you’re reading represents good writing?

Most people believe that good writing is subjective. They think it is an art, not a science, which is to say that it’s imprecise, follows loose guidelines and is open to interpretation. This approach is in direct contrast to a field such as civil engineering, where there are complex and rigid rules of physics and unbreakable laws of nature that determine success or failure. The levee breaks, or it does not. The bridge stands, or it falls. You succeed, or you fail.

With writing there’s often a different perspective. Some journalists, writers, authors and creative services professionals contend these iron clad standards or formal litmus tests for their output do not exist. They say that good writing just is. Like the crusading politician said when asked what pornography is, “I can’t define it, but I know it when I see it.”

As screenplay writer Josh Olson wrote in the Village Voice in September 2009, “It rarely takes more than a page to recognize that you’re in the presence of someone who can write, but it only takes a sentence to know you’re dealing with someone who can’t.” But even that criterion can be inadequate when it comes to judging the written word. It’s one point to identify a thing’s qualities—this tastes good, that smells bad, this looks great—but it’s another altogether to be able to say why and to apply those same standards to another example.

In an attempt to be more discerning, perhaps in business in particular, it’s best to judge writing not as an art, but as a science. That sounds counter-intuitive, but we have to look at the purpose of the writing and whether that purpose is achieved. What is the goal of business writing? To communicate an idea or to relay information. Business writing is clear, precise, organized and logical. That’s not to say it should be boring, but, on the other hand, it’s not Hemingway or Steinbeck and isn’t meant to be.

Using this criteria (clear, precise, organized and logical), we have a standard by which we can judge the effectiveness of business writing: Does it achieve its purpose? If the goal is to explain a new management strategy, does it adequately do so? If a memo is intended to define a company policy, does it achieve that purpose? Does the reader understand the information? Is the information easy to retain? If the answers are “yes,” then the written output is a success.

The rapid advance of technology has resulted in the addition of many new and interesting words into our vocabulary that weren’t around even a few years ago. My favorites are the nouns that somehow become verbs. Here are a few examples:

E-mail: Remember, this is an abbreviation for the noun electronic mail, which went out with the Clinton administration. And it’s been a verb for a while now: Please e-mail me that picture of you at the beach.

Text: Once a noun that meant a document or book, today it’s what everybody does with cell phones. Tom texted me, but I was in a meeting and couldn’t get to my phone.

Defense: Heard mostly in sports circles, defense has somehow replaced to defend or to defend against. Do we chalk this one up to jocks abusing the English language? Example: The Saints’ explosive offense has proven tough to defense for opposing teams. Honorable mention: Audible, or what happens when the quarterback suddenly and unexpectedly changes the agreed-upon play at the line of scrimmage. Peyton Manning audibled a pass play when he saw the defensive formation.

Google: Once a word known only to mathematicians, googol is 10 the power of 100, or 10¹⁰⁰. (Not to be confused with a googolplex, which is 10^googol.) Then, the Internet search engine (and now advertising conglomerate) Google came along and blew the competition to pieces. Now Google is synonymous with Internet searching in the same way that Kleenex is synonymous with tissue. I asked my math teacher what a googol was, and she said to google it.

Resource: This is a new one to me, but White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs used it the other day when discussing the administration’s plans for Afghanistan. “I will let Secretary Rumsfeld explain … whether he thinks that the effort in Afghanistan was sufficiently resourced during his tenure as secretary of defense,” White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said Wednesday.

Unfriend: Oxford American Dictionary’s 2009 word of the year, unfriend is Facebook slang for removing someone from your list of Facebook friends. It’s the bastard child of friend, which means to befriend someone on Facebook. Bob unfriended me after I made fun of his golf game.

Torrent: No longer a wall of rushing water, the verb form of torrent means to download something from the Internet using “bit torrent” technology, usually a pirated copy of a song, movie or software. Rather than pay $24.99 for the Harry Potter DVD, I just torrented it to my laptop.

And there are more: to spam, to parent, to photoshop a picture…ad naseum. Why are these words important, you ask? Some of them may seem odd now, but odds are, they’ll become a part of the lexicon and therefore important for anyone in the communication business to know. As the cell-phone texting, unfriending and torrenting millenial generation assumes more and more of a leadership role in business and politics, these terms will become the norm. And as the baby boomers retire, their own cultural dictionary will retire with them.

I’ve blogged on Trade Secrets about finding the right media outlets for your company’s press releases. It’s no secret that the trade press offers tremendous value by allowing you to precisely target your message to an audience and establish yourself as a subject matter expert and thought leader.

Odds are, there are multiple publications to which your company can submit press releases and story ideas. These may be trade publications specific to your niche or more general business or management publications, as well as websites. One thing is certain—every one of them has a specific set of rules or editorial requirements that spell out what kinds of writing they’ll accept, story lengths, deadlines and other important details. And unless the publication or website is new, they’ll have a history of stories they’ve already run, contained in their previous issues or archives.

A sure way to turn off an editor and sink any hopes of getting your story into their publication is to not do your homework. Offering to write an opinion piece on trends in LED light bulbs for home applications will not fly in a publication that prints only hard news on commercial and industrial lighting—especially since they devoted an entire issue to LED lighting back in June.

First, download a copy of the publication’s editorial guidelines from its website—and if you don’t see them there, call. Read them carefully and make sure you understand what types of writing the publication accepts. Then, study the publication’s archives and editorial calendars. Find out what topics they’ve covered and how recently as well as what interests them for the future. With a little time and patience, you can identify several publications that will be very interested in what you have to say, and you may even pick up a few new ideas yourself.

Trade Press Services excels at matching compelling, timely, innovative story ideas for businesses with the highly targeted content trade publications seek. To get started, just call Trade Press Services today.