As a small business, you want to make sure every aspect of your work is impeccable. The way you communicate with your customers, partners, and clients is immensely important. And, since most of that communication today is done online, your writing skills significantly influence your productivity and success as a business. That’s why you need to work on improving them and helping all your employees do the same.
To help you out, we’ve put together a list with 8 tips on how to improve your writing skills. Let’s take a closer look.
Form an Idea
Before you start writing anything, you need to take a moment to think about what you want to say. There needs to be a clear idea about what you want to say. That means that you need to define:
- your goal/purpose
- your main message/argument/idea
Let’s say you’re writing an email to potential business partners. Think about your goal. Do you want them to be impressed, interested, or convinced? Do you want them to write back an email or give you a call?
Make sure you have a clear idea of what the purpose of your writing is before you start writing.
Always Outline
Outlining is a winning writing practice. There’s nothing quite so helpful and practical as outlining the piece of content you want to create.
Outlining implies:
- brainstorming ideas and points to include
- organizing those points
- creating a writing scheme
So, if you’re writing a blog post about starting a new business, you’ll need to think about the tips to include, the arguments to make, and the information to provide. All of this will make a great outline.
Writing Clarity
When it comes to business writing, there’s little or no room for too much embellishment. Things need to be stated the way they are and the reader needs to receive a clear message.
To remove the ambiguity and ensure maximum clarity, you should follow these writing principles:
- write simple sentences that clearly state an idea
- use simple vocabulary
- avoid poetic writing, metaphors, and jokes
- arrive at a point quickly
- avoid long introductions
- be concise
This means that your content should mostly include information that is valuable, factual, meaningful, and supports your claims or arguments. If you start writing complex content, your readers will either lose their focus or give up reading completely.
Aim for clarity, and you’ll have their full attention.
Neat Structure
The structure of your content can influence how the readers perceive it. It can help them process and understand the content you’re sharing. It can even make it more believable and reliable in their eyes.
This is why you should rely on a neat structure when writing emails, blog posts, social media posts, or your website content. Here’s what we have in mind:
- create attention-grabbing headlines
- use subheadings and write them in larger fonts
- divide the content into smaller paragraphs
- use bullet points and lists
- use bold and italics to emphasize important information
A neat structure like this will help the reader scan the content, find the information they need, and enjoy reading it altogether.
Learn About Your Audience
When you’re writing in the name of your business, you need to be ready to write for different target groups of people. That means that you have to analyze and learn about your audience every time you’re about to start writing.
For example, you could be writing:
- a blog post for your younger audience
- an email for your senior customers
- a social media post for your followers
- a business offer to a potential business partner
Different groups of people require a different approach to writing on your behalf. Make sure you understand who you’re writing for and adjust your style and tone to their needs and preferences.
Facts vs. Opinions
As a business, you’re not allowed to be overly subjective or share content that is based purely on your personal opinion. Instead, you should base your content on facts.
That means that your content should:
- provide arguments and claims
- support them with facts, data, number, or statistics
- explain things instead of state them
People want to see how you got to a conclusion or how you formed an opinion. Knowing where it all comes from will make it easy for them to trust you completely.
Proofread
Everything you write represents your small business. This is why you can’t allow for any mistakes or oversights in writing to ruin your credibility.
So, make sure you proofread everything you write before you send it or publish it.
Proofreading includes:
- removing grammar mistakes
- removing spelling mistakes
- adjusting the structure
- double-checking vocabulary
In case you need help with proofreading and editing your content, GetGoodGrade can do it for you. They can analyze and rewrite the parts that need adjustment.
Reinforce Your Brand
As a business, you need to have a branding strategy that defines who you are and how you present yourself to your customers. And, everything you write within your content marketing strategy needs to reinforce your branding decisions.
That means that you need to stay loyal and consistent in your:
- personality
- style of writing
- tone and voice
- vocabulary
You need to make sure your writing agrees with your branding on all the platforms you’re using. This way, a person reading your content will know it’s you, just by recognizing your style.
That will boost your credibility and make people grow more familiar with you.
Final Thoughts
Improving your business writing skills can positively impact your small business’ productivity. You’ll be able to communicate better and show people how professional, well-informed, and trustworthy you are.
Use the tips we’ve shared above to start working on improving your writing skills. Get your employees on board and help them acquire and polish the same writing skills.
Author’s bio. Jessica Fender is a copywriter and blogger with a background in marketing and sales. She enjoys sharing her experience with like-minded professionals who aim to provide customers with high-quality services.