Writing tip: Pop the balloon or make it your focus

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A stroll along San Antonio’s River Walk inspired this writing tip because an out-of-place detail grabbed my eye.

A white balloon bobbed along the surface of the river. Once I spotted the balloon, I couldn’t see anything else. Not pale gray stone walls. Not the greens or browns of shrubs and trees. Not the pale blue sky.

Something similar happens to your readers when your blog post, article, or white paper includes details that don’t belong there. They get distracted. They can’t grasp your “big picture” message. Just as I couldn’t absorb the River Walk’s beauty. You can help your readers by popping your “white balloon” to remove distractions from your main message.

Alternatively, sometimes your draft’s “white balloon” is a signal that you should shift your focus to center on the balloon, as I have in this piece–and in the photo below.

Note: This post was edited on August 9 and 23.

Information density: Weakness or strength?

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Are you hitting the right level of information density in your writing?

Image by Peter Morville

“Often white papers on technical subjects written for an executive audience have…too much technical detail,” says Robert Bly in The White Paper Marketing Handbook: How to Generate More Leads and Sales with White Papers, Special Reports, Booklets, and CDs (p.16.) Bly’s comment made me think about pieces written by portfolio managers and other financial experts. Their enthusiasm for their topic often gets them bogged down in details.

Benefits first, details later

If you’re a financial professional, remember to focus first on the benefit of your expertise to your readers. Then, you can delve into the details.

Not sure if you have too much detail? Ask an objective member of your target audience for feedback.

Too little data can also hurt

Meanwhile, remember that an absence of detail can also handicap your white paper by undercutting your credibility. As Bly says, often “…white papers written for engineers and scientists have too low an information density (they are too superficial).”

Imagine, for example, you’re trying to sell a new trading system to an investment management system. The president of your prospect company will seek information differently from the company’s head of information technology.

You need to know your audience before you start writing, so you can tailor communications to them.

My process for writing your financial white paper

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How does the process work when you write a white paper? Prospective clients often ask this question.

Here’s a chart that shows how I typically tackle a white paper. Of course, the process can be adapted to your needs.

Questions? Ask away!

No batteries required: My favorite blogging technique

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At LBJ's Texas White House

If you’re a blogger, you’ve probably struggled to find time to write. Me too.

Blogging on vacation

My favorite place to blog – and to develop a warehouse of posts – is on an unplugged vacation. In fact, I’m writing this post in black ink on a steno pad. My boxy printing and black ink are supposed to make my drafts easy for my typist to decipher. I use a spiral-bound steno pad, so I don’t lose pages.

Blogging offline

I like the slow speed and lack of distractions that come with blogging offline. When I type up a draft, it’s too easy to tinker with my text as I go. Writing in ink – even though I double-space to allow for essential corrections – limits my edits. This is a plus.

Writing offline helps with my focus. It’s just me, my ideas, my steno pad, and my pen. Tough luck for my tweeps. Any brilliant one-liners will be lost to posterity (or obscurity) as I home in on my blog.

Paper fans

I was surprised to learn that I’m not alone. I found more paper fans when I ran a Facebook poll on “Where’s your favorite place to blog?” I suspect that our numbers will decline as technological changes take hold.

P.S. – This was written on a flight to Atlanta, en route to Austin, Texas.

Reader challenge: Rewrite this sentence to make it more powerful

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Are you up for a challenge? Try rewriting the following sentence to make it more powerful.

Our firm has managed money for wealthy investors for 33 years.

Reader challenge: Propose a new title for this commentary

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Titles count. Especially in these days of search engine optimization, better known as SEO. But even without SEO, the quality of your blog post or article title can make a difference in your readership.

Today’s Reader Challenge is coming up with a better title for a piece of published investment commentary: “The ‘Great Recalibration.’ ”

First reactions to “The ‘Great Recalibration’ ” as a title

When I skimmed the title “The ‘Great Recalibration,’ ” I couldn’t tell what it was about. Then I read “Volatility in third-party credit ratings heightens the value of proprietary credit research.” Aha. This told me I was reading about bonds and that there might be some useful information in the article. This prompted the Facebook poll you see below.

However, reader comments (see below) on the poll made me think this title provides good fodder for conversation.

Please give your title suggestions below. You’ll probably want to visit the article–at least briefly. I look forward to hearing from you.

POLL: Which mind mapping solution works best for you?

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Mind mapping is a powerful tool for brainstorming, analysis, and presentations. I know a handful of advisors and investment professionals who feel passionately about the value of mind mapping. I do, too.

You can create mind maps with paper and pencil or on the computer. I prefer the old-fashioned way, so I asked some of my social media friends what they use and why.

MindJet

“I chose Mindjet because it has the most extensive array of templated maps as compared to other systems. For example Mindjet has ready made templeted maps for business plans, story outlines, SWOT analysis, etc. I have found Mindjet to be very useful in this regard and as I have used them for our company strategy sessions and general brainstorming,” says Alex Murguia of McLean Asset Management.

Mindmeister

Jude Boudreaux of Upperline Financial likes Mindmeister.

I’ve used it, too, because the basic version is free and pretty easy to pick up.

Mindomo

Russ Thornton of Wealthcare Capital Management is one of my favorite resources for new technology. Here’s what Russ says:

Xmind

Dave Grant of  Vantage Financial Partners says, “I use xmind as a project management tool. We have monthly meetings and each meeting is its own “spoke” from the main subject, then each discussion in that meeting is its own “sub-spoke.” You can see see a year’s worth of project in a quick glance – great tool.”

Paper and pencil

Like Nathan Gehring of MyFirstFinancialPlanner.com, I like paper and pencil.

I imagine that when children learn mapping in school, as I discussed in “What your kids can teach you about writing,” they use paper and pencil.

If you’re not familiar with mind mapping…

There’s a decent introduction to mind mapping on Wikipedia.

Please answer my poll on mind mapping solutions, which you’ll find in the right-hand column of this blog. If you don’t see your software listed there, you can add it. I also included paper and pencil as an option.

Here are links to the software options listed above:

If none of these options work for you, you’ll find more listed in my 2008 post on “More options for mind mapping.” To learn more about using mind mapping in your blogging, check out my class on “How to Write Blog Posts People Will Read.”

Usage tips for portfolio performance commentary writers

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It’s almost time for quarter-end investment performance reporting. I have some tips for you.

1. Use the past tense.

Why? Because portfolio performance commentary discusses historical performance.

2. Describe benchmarks’ key characteristics, when appropriate.

The general public doesn’t know the difference between the S&P 500 and the S&P 400. They may think one is a subset of the other, like the Fortune 50 and the Fortune 1000. So specify “the mid-cap S&P 400.”

3. Be consistent in how you spell and punctuate terms.

For example, choose between “indexes” and “indices.” Decide whether you’ll use “small cap” exclusively without a hyphen or hyphenate it as “small-cap” when you use it as an adjective.

4. Limit your references to the time period.

Once you establish that you’re writing about the second quarter, don’t repeat that information frequently. However, if you shift between discussing the second quarter and the month of June, name the periods often enough that your reader follows your transitions.

5. Don’t go crazy replacing “returned,” as in “the fund returned 3%.”

There are plenty of other ways to convey the information in the sentence. However, I believe too much variety is counterproductive in a paragraph that consists mainly of returns. Instead, the variety distracts from the reader’s ability to compare returns. If you’re citing many index returns, perhaps you should insert a table.

Do you have grammar, punctuation, or other usage tips for people writing about investment performance? Please leave them as comments below.

EARLY BIRD rate expires JUNE 22 for highly rated blogging class

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Time is running out to register at the Early Bird rate for “How to Write Blog Posts People Will Read: A Self-Paced 5-Lesson Writing Class for Financial Advisors.” This rate, exclusively for my e-newsletter subscribers and clients, expires at 12 midnight on Wednesday, JUNE 22.You will find details about the class on the registration page.

Register for How to Write Blog Posts People Will Read: A 5-Week Writing Teleclass for Financial Advisors in Once-a-week telephone conference call for 5 weeks, April 22-May 20 on Eventbrite
You will learn how to

  1. Generate and refine ideas for blog posts that will engage your readers
  2. Organize your thoughts before you write, so you can write more quickly and effectively
  3. Edit your writing, so it’s reader-friendly and appealing


Here’s what advisors say:

  • “The class is great! I’m really getting a huge amount of value — there really is a process to writing.”
  • “Loving the blog writing class I am taking with @susanweiner #FF”
  • “Susan’s coaching is a classic case of ‘under-promise, over-deliver.’ I highly recommend her as a writing coach or teacher. Her coaching has improved the quality of writing in my blog posts. My writing skills were very rusty when we started. Susan’s practical, insightful suggestions–along with her Blog Post Preparation Worksheet–have been an incredibly valuable resource.”

The class format has been tweaked to accommodate your summer vacation and busy periods. So don’t delay. Sign up TODAY for “How to Write Blog Posts People Will Read”!

Register for How to Write Blog Posts People Will Read: A 5-Week Writing Teleclass for Financial Advisors in Once-a-week telephone conference call for 5 weeks, April 22-May 20 on Eventbrite

Questions? Call me at 617-969-4509, email me at info@investmentwriting.com, or read the class FAQ.


Bullets can streamline your writing

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Investment RFP writers–the folks who fill out those tiresome questionnaires called requests for proposals–sometimes get sloppy.

Photo by Paul Watson

Tight deadlines allow little time for copyediting. This before-and-after example shows how adding bullet points can streamline an RFP answer. The “after” example is also easier to skim.

BEFORE editing

Each month, you can expect a summary report via email that includes your portfolio’s performance results, attribution analysis, and portfolio characteristics. We send the summary reports no later than six business days following month end.

AFTER editing

Within six business days of month end, you will receive by email a summary of your portfolio’s

  • Performance
  • Attribution analysis
  • Key characteristics

How you can crack this editing challenge

Could you achieve the “after” version on your own?

It’s a result that mind mapping, which I discuss in “How to Write Blog Posts People Will Read,” could help you to achieve.