Here are six rules of thumb that will help you write a sales message that actually helps you move an opportunity forward. I’ve got a few examples below, too, so you can see how to turn a bad message into a better one.
1. Write like you talk.
Sales messages are meant to be spoken. Even when somebody reads the message, you want readers to feel like you’re talking to them personally. Therefore, whenever you write a sales message, ask yourself: “Does this sound like something I’d actually say to a real person?” If not, your message won’t work well.
Before: “Engineers efficiently evaluate and improve their designs using our software tools. We are dedicated to building the most advanced vehicle system simulation tools.”
After: “Engines designed with our simulation software are more fuel-efficient than those that aren’t.”
2. Use common words rather than biz-blab.
Unfortunately, when most business folks sit down to write something, they turn into Dilbert’s pointy-haired boss and start writing in gibberish, stuffing sentences full of important-sounding terminology that means little or nothing. The cure is to use simple nouns and verbs that have a precise meaning.
Before: “We provide ‘one stop shopping’ for all of your HR needs. Through a single relationship, you have access to HR services for the continuum of the employment life cycle.”
After: “We help our clients with hiring, compensation, compliance, and training, so that they can spend more time running their business and less time and hassle dealing with HR details.”
3. State facts rather than promises.
Promises are only meaningful to people who already trust you, and that list probably doesn’t include prospects who aren’t yet customers. In fact, most people view a promise from a stranger with skepticism if not outright suspicion.
It’s more effective to provide a quantitative, verifiable fact that creates credibility.
Before: “You’ll love our dedicated account managers, comprehensive inventory, reliable delivery and competitive pricing.”
After: “Our customers save as much as $100,000 a year when they purchase directly from our account managers.”
Today is March 4 and you know what that means. It’s National Grammar Day! Here are ten ways to celebrate.
1. Send someone you love a Grammar Day e-card from the Grammar Girl site.
2. Peruse the online Chicago Manual of Style.
3. Challenge your skills by taking the Newsroom 101 writing tests.
4. Buy yourself a grammar t-shirt.
5. Set up an RSS feed for the Society for the Promotion of Good Grammar blog.
6. Ridicule people who put their bad grammar on display.
7. Have fun with number six and continue ridiculing people who put their bad grammar on display.
8. Read about what drives real grammar and spelling snobs.
9. Join the Facebook Group Knowing the Difference Between “Their”, “There” and “They’re”.
10. Leave a comment chastising me for all the grammar mistakes I’ve made in my life.
Barbara Govednik launched 423 Communication in 2001 to helps its clients tell their stories through freelance writing services, coaching and editing services, and employee communication consulting and implementation. Read Barbara’s Being Well Said Blog.
One of my writing coaching clients sent me a link to a blog post about exclamation points. I was fond of striking them from her text as I edited her website content. And it does seem that they pop up with more frequency these days. (Insert your own comment here about how social media destroys all, if you’re not too busy yelling at the neighbor kids to get off your lawn.)
The essential questions in the Authentic Organizations blog post were this: are exclamation points unprofessional, do they corrode the credibility of women and did the writer really care or not? You can read it here.
I don’t have a problem with exclamation points in general. They serve a purpose and give writers the ability to use their authentic voice when writing, which I always advocate for myself and all the writers I work with.
However, I do have an issue with exclamation points used in bulk (and I believe that ending three out of four sentences that way as the blogger did is the very definition of “bulk.”) Whether you are a man or woman, use that many exclamation points and you make your writing start to sound breathless and vaguely like an infomercial. Act now! Limited time offer! Operators are waiting! The blanket that has sleeves!
So go ahead and use an exclamation point now and then. Moderation is the key here, just as it annoyingly is in all good things. Just don’t use multiples. There is no excuse for ending any sentence with !!!! unless you are a fourteen-year-old girl trying to convey just how cute that boy in your homeroom is and you agree to dotting all your I’s with hearts.
Barbara Govednik launched 423 Communication in 2001 to helps its clients tell their stories through freelance writing services, coaching and editing services, and employee communication consulting and implementation. Read Barbara’s Being Well Said Blog.
When you try to be persuasive in writing or speaking, you probably spend a lot of time crafting the message, but you might be overlooking something that is more important than your content.
An audience often decides how it will respond to a persuasive appeal based not on the message itself but on whether the communicator is credible. Credibility, according to psychologist Dan O’Keefe, is the audience’s assessment of whether you are believable. If your audience does not view you as credible, strengthen your image by working on three things people usually consider in judging credibility.
1) Expertise – Be an expert in your field, because people are persuaded to do things when they view the communicator as an authority in the field. And it doesn’t only apply to people. Consumer Reports magazine is the leading source of trusted information when people want to buy a product. Why? Because they view it as credible.
2) Trustworthiness – Be fair, be honest, be a good listener, and be respectful of your audience. A major reason people are not persuaded to do something or to believe something is because the communicator was rude, sarcastic, condescending, or, in some other way, disrespectful.
3) Confidence. Carrying yourself with confidence is reflected in the way you dress (be a sharp dresser) and in the way you speak. Don’t use hedging language because when you hem, haw, and ramble, you don’t sound like you have control of the message (in writing or speaking), and you do not come across as being confident.
Reading from a screen isn’t the same as reading from a piece of paper. I say this at the risk of a) telling you something you already know and b) sounding like a curmudgeonly Luddite who can’t cope with new-fangled technology.
Many of us intrinsically know this is true. There is more scanning, and in many instances, more distraction to skip to someplace else. Turns out that science backs up the hunch.
According to The Chronicle of Higher Education (which I read online), an article was published in the Journal of Research in Reading (which I didn’t read at all) that highlighted the research of Anne Mangen. She gets all metaphysical and says that “digital texts are ontologically intangible,” so we have a different physical relationship to them, it influences our immersion into the material and other outcomes.
The best bit is this line from the Chronicle quoting Mangen: “One effect, Mangen maintains, is that the digital text makes us read ‘in a shallower, less focused way.'”
We accepted this truth about our shallow, scanning and skipping audiences long ago. And we’ve worked to adjust for it as writers. But I had to wonder if I was fully embracing it as an editor.
In the name of efficiency and environmentalism, I generally edit electronically using any of the available markup tools Microsoft Word offers. This puts me squarely in the audience’s skipping and scanning shoes. It lets me make sure that the text accommodates this arms’ length relationship and that the main points can be plucked here, there or anywhere.
But I also have a responsibility to make the work correct and complete. The writer’s little mistakes and near-misses need to be ferreted out and corrected. I can’t do this well if I am skipping and scanning on screen. That requires immersion.
Which means I either need to let go of my resistance to killing trees and marking up a hardcopy with the old red pen or learn to buck nature and immerse myself in my laptop. Although the latter sounds kind of scary and Tron-like. (E-mail me if you are less ancient than I and don’t understand that reference.)
When editing a piece meant to be read on screen, editors play a dual role. We have to experience the content as the reader will, and we have to bring a critical, detail-oriented eye. What do you do to accommodate both?
Barbara Govednik launched 423 Communication in 2001 to helps its clients tell their stories through freelance writing services, coaching and editing services, and employee communication consulting and implementation. Read Barbara’s Being Well Said Blog.
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Trick #1: Know your audience. If you’re communicating with another wordie, go ahead and use challenging language. This person will appreciate it. (Honestly: I just wrote a memo with “purview” in it because I knew the CEO would like it!) If not, forget it. Most people read for content and not for style, and if you’re choosing words that scream “pay attention to me,” then they’re shouting over your content.
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Trick #2: Watch for jargon. This falls into the same category as $64,000 words for me. Those who don’t know them feel excluded, stupid and angry. When jargon is appropriate, define your term the first time it appears. Those who know it will congratulate themselves, and you’ll avoid negativity from everyone else.
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Trick #3: Kill the Latinate words. These are the long ones that sound like legal terms, and have their origins in Latin. (For my money, there’s a reason they call it a “dead language.”) This includes terms such as “therefore” (try “so”), “pursuant” (try “after”), “heretofore” (try “until now”), and “notwithstanding” (try “although”). When given the option of a complex versus a simple word, go for the latter—don’t let your words get in the way of your meaning.
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Trick #4: Use the thesaurus sparingly. Most people pick one up because they’re using the same word a lot and want to give their readers some variety. This is a noble gesture. But a thesaurus can also be a crutch. Instead of trying to find new ways to express yourself, you just want to change one word. And often you end up going several words deep among the synonyms to find one that will work—and the further you go on the list, the more obscure the term becomes. Remember: it’s not just about word choice—it’s about thoughtful writing.
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Trick #1: What am I trying to do? It’s Communications 101: what’s the purpose of all this? Am I trying to educate someone on a topic? Am I looking to get their agreement? Am I trying to get them to take action (and what would that be, by the way)? Am I looking to get more information from them?
You’d be surprised by the number of people who don’t consider why they’re speaking or writing before they start. Don’t be one of them. If you know what you want, you’ve exponentially increased the chances you’ll actually get it.
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Trick #2: Who am I trying to reach? Let’s face it: your family and friends will cut you a lot more slack on your latest love than anyone else. But not your boss, when you’re trying to convince her that you have a great idea for a new project. But not your client, when you’re trying to convince him to spend more money with you when he’s already feeling budget constrained. But not the reporter on the phone, when you’re trying to convince him that this is a great story his readers can hardly wait to know more about.
So when you’re spending that extra few seconds deciding what you want to accomplish before the communication, take a few more to think about the people on the other end of it. Here’s your checklist.
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Why would they want to hear from you?
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When would they want to hear from you?
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How would they want to hear from you?
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What’s in it for them?
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What objections could they raise to your idea—and how could you address these up front so they don’t get the chance to use them to end the communication?
And the all-important—and often overlooked—What do I do if they actually agree with me and want to move forward? That’s another downside of passion: sometimes we’re so busy waxing eloquent about our subject that we don’t know when to stop! Then we can run the risk of talking people out of something they initially agreed to.
Let’s talk links. That’s right, web links. Because most of the links we see on intranets and employee portals just stink. That’s right, stink.
Recent client usability testing efforts resulted in some classic examples of how not to do it.
- Avoid using software package titles as links: One client uses “Rosetta Stone” as the link to the language learning modules they offer employees. Problem is, most employees don’t know what Rosetta Stone is. They’d like to find the language learning options, but when asked to, can’t.
- Don’t separate what goes together. Notice how employees group and label a topic. For example, one group of employees is inclined to put compensation stuff together with benefits stuff. They can group the compensation stuff together, but they don’t know how to label it and they don’t really think of it as its own separate group. When put with “benefits” it all makes sense to them. So, the link becomes “Benefits & Compensation.”
- Don’t use acronyms for navigation. When faced with a bunch of HR navigation such as FMLA, L&D and SPD, most employees just ignored them and hit the search. Heavy use of search means your navigation is failing you.
- Don’t use terms that aren’t easily understood in every country. One term may not mean the same thing to employees in different countries. Some terms are far more recognizable to employees in the U.S. than in other parts of the world.
Obviously, links also must be prioritized and well organized. Here is some recent insight from Jakob Nielsen on the use of mega drop-down menus. We think this is a really cool approach for dealing with a lot of descriptive navigation.
But, it still has to be descriptive. Even a great mega drop-down menu won’t work if the link language is vague, unfamiliar and laden with acronyms.
Stacy Wilson, ABC, is president of Eloquor Consulting, Inc., in Lakewood, Colorado
140 characters, the limit of a Twitter post, fill up fast. Hamlet’s soliloquy screeches to a halt right around “outrageous fortune.”
Want more examples of the Twitterization of literature, opera and even recipes? Check out this NPR piece.
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Trick #1: Whose purpose does it serve? Does our deathless prose actually help readers understand the point we’re making—or is its point to make us look good?
Let’s be honest: anyone who writes something for others must have a bit of an ego—otherwise she wouldn’t be able to write. But let’s keep the emphasis on “bit of” rather than “an ego.” It’s quaint to read Victorian novels that address us as “dear reader,” reminding us that the author has an active role in what we’re reading. However, it’s death to a communication or piece that’s meant to persuade when our writerly fingerprints smear the important points.
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Trick #2: Do others’ suggestions improve what we’ve written? This is perhaps the best test of the amount of ego in your writing. Spend that extra second asking, “What will my readers better understand: my presentation or the new one?” And if it’s the new one, make the change. (Then find a way to work your beloved phrase into a conversation with friends who will appreciate it.) When your purpose is to communicate with others, their needs trump yours.
Sometimes the suggestion doesn’t improve the text, and your approach is the better solution—then keep it. Some people don’t believe they’ve done their job unless they change something they’re reviewing, so know when this is happening to you. (We’ll get to “The All the World’s a Frustrated Author Theory” next time …)
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Trick #3: Don’t argue about it. If you are (inwardly) jutting out your jaw as you explain to someone why your words are better than theirs, then you’ve already lost the battle. There’s no way you can come off as anything but defensive or egotistical—calling your credibility into question. It’s just not worth it. Over your career, you’ll create many wonderful communications—if you don’t antagonize the people who pay you to do this. Live to write another day.
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Trick #1: Is this communication really necessary? We’re communicators: we default to wanting to share information. But we need to take that extra second to consider what the people we’re trying to reach really want from us. If it’s that analytical guy mentioned earlier: he can hardly wait until you send more data, so go ahead! But what if it’s someone who already received hundreds of emails a day—and is unhappy about it?
Do we need to send the email with a bit of information this morning, another with some more this afternoon, and a third tidbit tomorrow morning? Sometimes it’s better to wait until you have it all and can send just one. Why risk annoying the person you’re trying to reach?
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Trick #2: Is this the best way to communicate? Back to that endless email—like those mythical fruitcakes at the holidays that circle the globe. One of the main reasons this happens is no one picks up the phone and has a five-minute conversation—or even worse, people won’t walk down the hall and poke their heads into someone’s office for a quick decision. Ask what’s the most efficient way to get something done—rather than what’s the easiest way for you—and take that approach.
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Trick #3: Am I really adding value? This is my beef about e-newsletters and e-zines. I understand the theory: provide some good information to showcase the value my company offers, which encourages potential customers to contact me. But most of the ones I see seem to scream “me, Me, ME!”
They may begin with a chit-chatty tidbit about what the author has been up to lately. They may follow up with a project they just completed, which they thought was interesting (so you should, too). They may give you platitudes about your industry to show they know it (aren’t you tired of reading about “what you can do in a difficult economy”—which begins with hiring their firm?). The best ones—and the only ones anyone really reads—are the e-newsletters that give us ideas we can use to make improvements right away. So when you’re doing this, put the value up front—and save the happy talk about your latest holiday for a Twitter or Facebook posting.
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Trick #1: Laugh. The article I wrote was about a diabetes management program. My laugh was that it went out thin and came back overweight—the opposite of what the company intended for the program I was writing about. My greatest chuckle came from reading a 63-word sentence, with the end repeating words from the beginning—because it was so long that even the re-writer forgot where it started.
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Trick #2: Don’t look for imagined slights. Don’t begin with thinking, “People don’t like my ideas (or me) and took them out,” or “They don’t think I covered everything adequately so had to add something.” People make changes for all kinds of reasons—and many have nothing to do with you. It could be someone had a bad day and is taking it out on your copy. It could be that someone hates a particular turn of phrase and will remove it whenever it appears. It could be that one reviewer doesn’t like another, so feels compelled to alter that person’s suggestions. You can only guess, so don’t begin by feeling inadequate.
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Trick #3: Ask for amplification. If someone makes a change you don’t understand—or don’t agree with—ask about it. Most people are happy to explain their suggestions. This situation presents two opportunities for you: 1) to learn something you might not otherwise know (ask me about the subjunctive tense …), and 2) to show you cared enough about what a commenter said to inquire further. Who knows: by discussing something, you might even convince the person that your approach is better.
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Trick #4: Ask “Does the change make the copy better?” Did it take too long to say something, and now it’s more concise? Did I need to include a longer explanation so the ultimate audience for this piece has a better sense of what is meant? Did I get sloppy and use incorrect grammar and punctuation, which someone has corrected to my shame? Remember, you want to have the final piece meet your goal: to persuade, to educate, to whatever. If someone’s comment moves you closer to your goal, that person has actually helped you.
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Trick #1: Build a super structure. Organize your thoughts before you write. If you’re not certain where you’re going, get your ideas down and then review them for the most logical progression. For example, if your intent is to persuade, put your strongest argument first—if you put it last, readers might not get that far and your best thinking will be missed. (See the fourth rule to write by: Begin with the End in Sight Theory: http://www.communitelligence.com/blps/article.cfm?weblog=78&page=727.)
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Trick #2: If a word doesn’t add—subtract it. Be merciless until there’s nothing left to tighten. Start with clichés. Never again write “enclosed please find” instead of “here is,” or “due to the fact that” instead of “because,” or “at this time” instead of “now.” Also know that if a sentence is 30 words, it’s too long, and there must be something you can cut. The average length in business writing is 10 to 12 words. Change that to eight to 10 if the material is complex, or when you’re writing emails.
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Trick #3: Practice word choice variety. Don’t begin several sentences in a row—or consecutive paragraphs—with the same word (especially “I”). Read each paragraph to ensure you aren’t repeating a word or phrase too often. But use that thesaurus sparingly: don’t signal readers that you’re searching very hard for another word to use. Also vary your transitions. My personal failing is to frequently use “so,” which means I look for that. Repetition—unless it’s effectively used for emphasis (“government of the people, by the people and for the people”)—is boring and makes readers zone out.
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Trick #4: Use the active voice. It’s the difference between “I will do it” versus “It will be done by me.” The first is much stronger—and shorter. The only reasons to take the passive approach are if you don’t know who did something, or don’t wish to identify that person.
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Trick #5: Watch for consistency. Keep an eye on changes in tense, such as sliding between past and present. Choose one and stick with it—unless you’re actually discussing different time frames. Do the same thing with capitalization: it’s either “Company” or “company” in the middle of a sentence. (I default to the latter because the former can look like legalese or bespeak a firm’s ego.) And watch that your subheads use the same approach: all bold, or underlined or the same color.
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Trick #6: Keep writing reference materials—or buddies—handy. If grammar, punctuation and usage are not your strong suits, know where to get help. Spell check is a good start but doesn’t catch everything. So have those books by your desk where you can easily use them—because if they’re down the hall, you’re more likely to guess, and perhaps wrongly. (You noticed I used “so” didn’t you?) Or know where to go online to get your questions answered. Or find that grammar maven who always seems to know the obscure rules. (That would be me.)
True confession: I am a bit of word geek. My husband and I love a good game of Scrabble. I check the “Word of the Day” on http://www.merriam-webster.com more often than I check the weather. Really. A favorite from last week was “blurge” a verb used largely in Australia and New Zealand to mean slacking off. Genius! Second confession: I like to travel and New Zealand is one of my favorite places on earth.
Which means I am dying to use “blurge” as much as possible to prove what a worldly smarty pants I am. However, being a worldly smarty pants isn’t conducive to being an effective communicator.
An extensive vocabulary scores big points with language arts teachers and the folks who create the SAT. But in real-life, it can be off-putting and confounding. It can muddle your point and prevent you from actually communicating something.
Am I advocating that you dumb down your words? No. You should sound like you, but an understandable you. Treat the fancy words the way you’d treat chili peppers in a recipe. A little can go a long way, although there may be audiences that can handle a great deal of the hot stuff.
I’ve taught myself to tame my inner word geek when writing for and talking with clients and other real people, and let it loose when I am playing Scrabble or doing writing practice. And you better believe I’ll be blurging all over the place this Memorial Day Weekend!
Barbara Govednik launched 423 Communication in 2001 to helps its clients tell their stories through freelance writing services, coaching and editing services, and employee communication consulting and implementation. Read Barbara’s Being Well Said Blog.
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Trick #1: Do Your Homework. It’s so simple but often the first thing we forget. If you’re trying to reach a publication (print or electronic), then spend some time reading it. (Thank goodness for the Internet—we had no alternative but the library or asking publications for copies before it.) Apply the same approach if it’s a television or online program. If you’re trying to reach a person, find out what you can about him or her first. Google, LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter: you can gather all sorts of information. If it’s someone in your organization—or another organization where you have connections—talk with people who know that person.
If it’s a company—a potential client or employer, perhaps—then check out its Web site (particularly the news releases) and competitors’ sites. And if it’s a public company, read its financial reports, quarterly financial conference call transcripts or analyst research reports.
This will separate you from all the other folks who have just done a cursory job, or haven’t even bothered. It also will fulfill the need of those you’re trying to reach: the belief that we’re all unique and the world should only send us messages tailored to us.
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Trick #2: Show You Know. Now that you have this intelligence, weave it in to your communication.
1. Explain why the story you’re proposing would be of interest to the publication’s readership or program’s viewership. (This shows you know who reads it/watches it and what they want.)
2. Reference an important point you discovered about the person from your online research or from people who know him or her. (This shows you value that person’s ideas, opinions, feelings, etc., which helps to create a bond.)
3. Mention the issues you know the company faces and how you have addressed them for other firms. (This shows how you can reduce the company’s risk in working with you—because you already know and have applied the information these people need.)
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Trick #3: Take Your Ego Out of the Equation. Let’s face it: even though you’re reaching out to this person or organization for your own purposes, as far as the recipients are concerned, it’s all about them. Focus any communication on their needs. Editors and producers want good stories: to keep their readership/viewership up and advertisers happy. Businesspeople and organizations want good ideas, or to improve their implementation: so their departments or operations are stronger, more cost-effective and competitive. Give them a taste of how you can solve their problems—rather than a dose of how wonderful you are.
The truth is that not every pitch you toss will be a homerun. You often have no control over the reasons why the batter won’t take a swing. But if your approach is well-crafted, you’ve eliminated the most common reason for being turned down—and sooner or later, your proposals are going to connect.
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Trick #1: Know What You Want. How many times have you fired off an email response or returned a phone call and not thought about what you hope will happen? The next time, spend that extra few seconds before and actually answer this question: “What do I want people do after this?” If you believe in visualization, picture them taking the action you’d like. Then ask yourself some simple questions:
- What problems will my approach solve for them? (Once again—people run away from pain faster than they run toward features and benefits.)
- What will they need to know so they can agree with me?
- What barriers would prevent them from taking the actions I want?
- How can I include information—in this communication or somewhere else—that will overcome these?
By knowing what you want—and how you can make others want the same thing—you’ve automatically increased the chances your reader will be persuaded by what you propose.
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Trick #2: Write with “Yes” in Mind. Have you ever had to write a memo and thought, “They’ll never sign off on this!” And, of course, you were right. It’s the reverse of positive thinking. When you’re sure your ideas will be rejected, that negativity will leak out in a million ways: the words you choose, the way you organize the information, and how much time you spend answering possible objections in advance.
If you can’t write with the belief that your ideas will be accepted, then do something else until you can. Listen to Henry Ford: “If you think you can do a thing or you think you can’t do a thing, you’re right.” Don’t shoot yourself in the foot before you begin. If this is an important communication, also know when is a good time to write it. If you’re a morning person, don’t start at 3:00 in the afternoon when you’re at low energy.
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Trick #3: Include the Call to Action. Tell your readers what you want them to do—and how to do it. If it’s a proposal, media “pitch” letter, or formal communication, the call to action falls at the end. You have used the rest of the piece to present your case so they will agree with you, and now you tell them how this should look.
If you’re writing an email, then put the call to action at the top. You may even want to put it in the subject line. This presumably is a shorter communication, so let your readers know right away what you want and then provide the (brief) details. Most people scan their emails. If your request falls at the bottom, they may not choose to scroll down several paragraphs to find out what you want and might miss it.By the way—don’t make this a “call me if you want to discuss this further.” You have no idea what else is on their plates, how important this is to them, or how many other things are hanging fire on their desks. Let them know when you will call to discuss the ideas—and then follow up.
Comments |
RE: Fourth Rule to Write By: The |
Another terrific posting, Lynne. Thank you. Your theory about beginning with a goal for the communications piece shouldn’t be surprising to anyone but all too often, people seem to get lost in the detail of the writing without remembering to focus on the goal of the piece. Writers do this at their peril – as do any sales people who forget to ask for the order or conduct a sales conversation without a positive outcome always in mind! Kim Dougherty |
Ian Lurie’s Conversation Marketing blog zeroes in on the keys to writing a headline for an online news story. Follow three rules:
Length isn’t (as much of) a constraint. In print, you have to make your headline fit a certain number of column inches. Online, you can add a word or two. Or three. Or even four. Don’t keep a headline short and uninformative.
Make the headline descriptive. It should stand completely on its own. It’s a micro-summary of the story. If written on a blank sheet of paper, it should tell the reader exactly what they’re going to learn in the rest of the story. Your headline will show up everywhere: In links, in search, etc.. Make sure it works in all those places.
Remember the search engines. Make sure your headline includes the words that folks will use to find the story. You don’t need to be an SEO pro to figure out that folks are more interested in ‘bank bailout’ than ‘Paulson stock purchases’ (keep reading for the full story on that example).
Continue reading: How to: NOT Write an Internet-Ready News Headline
The basic idea behind “brand alignment” is pretty simple – When it comes to delivering on your marketing promises, make sure everyone in your organization knows what’s going on and they’re able to walk the talk. Living up to that ideal, though, isn’t simple at all. It takes a concerted effort to get everyone tuned in and turned on to the principles and practices that align the “do” with the “say.”
Promise Broken
One revealing way to test if an organization is living the brand is to observe how they deal with customer complaints. I recently had an experience with a new service I subscribed to online that told me a lot in a hurry about what they believe and how they operate.
Within an hour after subscribing, I got a notice that the first program would be broadcast that same evening. They described the event and what the participants would learn during the one-hour session. I didn’t want to miss it, but I already had another meeting scheduled. Reluctantly, I contacted that person and asked if we could reschedule for the following evening. She agreed, so I was set to take part in the new program
About halfway through it, they still hadn’t talked about the topic that was advertised. I was getting suspicious that I had been sold a bill of goods – that this was yet another company that promised one thing and delivered something else. By the end of the program, they still hadn’t discussed the topic they had promoted, and I was fuming. It had been a long day … I was tired … I had wasted an hour … and I had put off another meeting.
Customer Disappointed
I decided to share one of my Inside Out lessons with them in the form of a “strongly worded” e-letter to what I thought was some nebulous person in the ether-world. To my amazement, I got a reply the next morning from a sales manager named James, expressing regret for my problem and promising to look into it. Later that day I had my next pleasant surprise. I got a real live phone call from James explaining how I had been connected to the wrong program. He also thanked me for informing them because they were able to contact other people who experienced the same problem. Then he said I would be set up in the near future to participate in the program that had been advertised.
Relationship Renewed
That would’ve been good enough, but then I got a call from David, their head of marketing. He had received my e-letter, too, and he also wanted to apologize for what happened. Then he really floored me – he said he wanted to give me a FREE lifetime subscription to their service. The only thing he asked in return was for me to give him occasional feedback on how I felt the service was meeting their customers’ needs.
I told him I thought his offer was very generous but I probably over-reacted a bit in my note, and his compensation was way more than I expected. To his credit, he would have nothing of my attempt to downplay my initial disappointment, and he apologized again for “wasting my time” and failing to give me what I was promised.
Execs in some companies might say he was crazy to give away so much. But I’m betting they don’t get many complaints like mine, and when they do, few people raise a fuss because the service is probably impeccable most of the time. Since it’s an online program, it’s not really “costing” them anything to give it to me free, but it still speaks volumes about their commitment to delivering on their promises – and living their brand.
Les Landes, Landes & Associates
Buy Les’s webinar replay: Getting to the Heart of Employee Engagement
As communicators, we’re responsible for writing clear, simple & memorable messages. But every now & then, we’re guilty of sharing lengthy, complex messages that’ll never be remembered? Consider this bad example of a key message by the Central Manchester & Manchester Children’s University Hospitals NHS Trust (Agenda for Change communication):
‘Where the combined value of the above payments before actual assimilation remains greater than the combined value of the payments after assimilation, the former level of pay will be protected. These protection arrangements apply to the combined value of payments before and after assimilation, not to individual pay components, excepting the provision relating to retention of existing on-call arrangements.’
While this example is extreme, the point is we must constantly remind ourselves to write in easy to understand terms that our audiences can relate to, allowing them to easily remember what it is we are trying to convey. A great, quick read that helps me stay on track with key message development is “Made to Stick” by Chip Heath & Dan Heath.
The basis of “Made to Stick” is why some ideas survive and others die. Using a framework of “succes” (simple, unexpected, concrete, credible, emotional, stories), the authors use examples that make the importance of key message development “STICK.”
Before you start reading, share examples of good and bad key messaging that you have run into or have created.
It’s ironic, isn’t it, that one of the surest ways to raise suspicion about someone’s motives is for the person to say, “Trust me on this?” That’s certainly true when it comes to employees and customers.
In the workplace, few challenges have obsessed and perplexed the business world more than the issue of employee trust. The reason is obvious. With it, virtually any obstacle can be overcome in an organization. Without it, every day is filled with uncertainty and anxiety, no matter what else the organization does right.
In the marketplace, few things are treasured more passionately than loyal customers – those people who come back time and again, and even refer new customers to enjoy the same experience.
When you get them both right, it’s business paradise. The crucial thing to understand is that the two go hand-in-hand. Without employee trust, customer trust suffers, as well.
Management Credibility Factors
One reason organizations fail to foster a culture of trust is because they focus mainly on interpersonal factors. They’re important, to be sure, and here are key behaviors that managers have to exhibit to gain employee trust:
- Caring – Genuine concern about employee wellbeing is where it has to start.
- Honesty and Openness – Dance around the truth or hide important information, and people tune out and turn away.
- Responsiveness – Listening and taking action on what you hear tells people you’re sincere.
- Competence – If you don’t know what you’re doing, it’s hard to win a following.
- Reliability – Can people count on you to do what you say?
- Apology – If you can admit mistakes and apologize sincerely, trust goes way up.
In a recent article I wrote for Communication World called “Cracking the Culture Code,” the communication VPs for Southwest Airlines and Enterprise Rent-A-Car talk about how their companies observe those behaviors in their extraordinarily successful cultures.
People-First Systems
But…that’s only half of the equation. You also have to design the systems, policies, and processes in a way that tells employees unequivocally that they are trusted. We call those People-First Systems, and they fall into five main categories:
- Measurement
- Rewards and recognition
- Communication
- Learning and development
- Continuous improvement
Of course, many organizations have some type of mechanism in place for all of those areas. But do they really demonstrate to employees that they are trusted? Do they truly reinforce the oft-heard mantra that people are our most important asset? Fact is, systems in most organizations are designed to protect against the miniscule number of irresponsible people, and those constraints wind up stifling the vast majority of employees you can count on like clockwork.
Bottom line, you can’t have performance excellence without sincere trust and belief in people. If you have doubts about the merits of that philosophy, consider the wisdom of renowned statesman, Henry Stimson, who said, “The only way to make a man trustworthy is to trust him.”
Les Landes, Landes & Associates
Buy Les’s webinar replay: Getting to the Heart of Employee Engagement
Remember when organizations used to talk about the “internal customer?” You still hear it sometimes, but it’s mostly fallen on the trash heap of yesterday’s useless business jargon – another example of a cutesy idea turned into a misguided metaphor.
You could argue that the proponents of that idea had their hearts in the right in place – i.e., coworkers should treat one another with the same regard and cooperation they give to customers. But think about the flipside of that comparison. One defining characteristic of a true company-customer relationship is this – if a customer gets sufficiently unhappy with the product or service they’re getting, they’re outta’ here.
That Ain’t No Way to Build Relationships
We like to think we’re fostering the kind of customer loyalty that will give us some wiggle room to recover if we screw up. But anyone who believes the typical disgruntled customer is going to stick around for long while you “work things out” is sorely mistaken. In fact, according to research, for every customer complaint a company gets, 25 more people have a similar problem, but instead of saying anything, they just quietly walk away.
Now, is that really the kind of relationship we want co-workers to have with one another? When things get tough and tensions run high and solutions are hard to find, do we want colleagues to bail out and say c’est la vie? Hardly. Fact is, we got it ass-backwards in the “internal customer” days. Instead of thinking of employees as customers, we should be thinking about both employees AND customers as partners.
No One’s an Audience Anymore
Luckily, we’re moving in the right direction. In recent years, there’s been a conspicuous shifting tide in employee communications – moving away from creating messages for an employee audience to engaging employees in conversations as partners and stakeholders. As it should be. After all, isn’t it a bit weird to think of the people who make everything happen in an organization as an “audience?” They ARE the organization. They certainly are NOT a passive recipient of messages – or at least they shouldn’t be.
But what about customers – the people communicators subject to a constant barrage of sales and marketing messages? Surely, THEY are an audience, right?
Engage your Partners – Inside and Out
Not according to the authors of the book Grapevine, who advocate WITH versus AT marketing. “AT marketing is about targeting, capturing, and one-way communication,” they say. (I won’t quibble for now over the faux pas of “one-way communication,” which is sort of like clapping with one hand.) “WITH marketing means that companies and consumers work with each other. They (companies) cease to think of consumers as targets. They find ways to … partner with them. In WITH marketing you don’t talk about capturing. You talk about listening. Targeting is a concept from the old days. Now it’s about engaging.”
Different organizations will take different approaches to engagement, to be sure. But the underlying premise is the same – messages don’t build relationships, conversations do – whether your partners are inside or out.
Les Landes, Landes & Associates
Buy Les’s webinar replay: Getting to the Heart of Employee Engagement