Tag Archive for: writing tips

Top problems in asset management firms’ blog posts

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Investment management firms are joining the blogosphere, but they’re off to a rocky start. Here are some mistakes that I’ve seen as I’ve sampled asset managers’ blog posts.

Mistake 1: Failing to adapt materials written for other media

Materials written for other media don’t transfer well to blogs. For example, I’m thinking about traditional market commentaries and position papers. Many of these commit the mistakes I list below.

The solution? Break your traditional materials into chunks and edit them to make them more reader friendly.

Mistake 2: Poor skimmability

Everybody skims content in these days of information overload. If you present big uninterrupted blocks of text without headings you’ll scare away readers who can’t quickly assess your content’s relevance.

To reel in readers, use informative headings. For example, don’t just write “Bond Market,” but share specific information. Perhaps something like “Convertibles attractive as Fed tapers.” or “Avoid this sector as Fed tapers.”

To enhance the skimmability of your posts, write short paragraphs.

Mistake 3: Excessive formality

The blogosphere is an informal place. Writers typically use “I” and address their readers as “you.” They also shun formal words and writing styles.

Asset managers, your blog is a great place to loosen up your writing style.

What do YOU think?

What are asset managers doing on their blogs that you like or dislike? I’m curious to hear your opinion.

If you’d like more guidance on writing blog posts, check out my book, Financial Blogging: How to Write Powerful Posts That Attract Clients.

Writing a list? Use parallel construction

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Lists are a great way to provide easy-to-skim content. This accounts for the popularity of blog posts with titles such as “Top 10 Ways to…” or “3 fatal mistakes of…” However, please construct your posts well, or you’ll lose readers.

One of the most important rules for lists is to use parallel construction. What’s that? For example, if the first of your “Three best tips” starts with an imperative verb saying “Do this,” then the rest of your tips should do the same.

Let’s compare Example A, which uses parallel construction, with Example B, so you can see how much better Example A is.

Here’s Example A:

1. Review your blog post to see if it includes the right information.

2. Check to see if the information is presented in the right order.

3. Copyedit your text.

Here’s example B:

1. Reviewing your blog post to see if it includes the right information can be helpful.

2. Check to see if the information is presented in the right order.

3. The final step is to copyedit your text.

If you’re like most people, you found Example A easier to skim and absorb than Example B.

Even professionally edited publications sometimes forget about the importance of parallel construction. I wrote this blog post after reading an article that promised a list of mistaken investment beliefs. Some of the items fit the description of “mistaken beliefs.” For example, the author does not believe that “‘Volatility’ Is For Misguided Geeks.” However, another item on the list shared one of the author’s beliefs instead of someone else’s mistaken belief.  Yet another item on the list was the author’s request to readers. I appreciated the author’s colorful writing. His headings were intriguing. However, I wish that he’d followed the rules of parallel construction.

 

Image courtesy of sritangphoto/ FreeDigitalPhotos.net

A case against writing outlines

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I’m not a big fan of outlines.

I wrote my Ph.D. dissertation using outlines. Perhaps that’s partly why the process felt like such a struggle. Since then, I’ve shifted from outlining to mind mapping.

Here’s what Donald Murray, author of Writing to Deadline: The Author at Work,Writing to Deadline by Donald Murray says about outlines:

…I found that formal outlines were prisons that restricted thought and discovery. They imposed a conscious organization that suppressed the subconscious text where real writing is done.

Murray’s statement resonates with me. How about you?

If you’d like to learn more about mind mapping, you’ll find step-by-step instructions in Financial Blogging: How to Write Powerful Posts That Attract Clients. You can also find some information on this blog, including “Photo + Mind Map = Blog Inspiration.”

FPA Connect – a secret weapon to improve your writing?

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The Financial Planning Association of Colorado inspired this tip, as a result of my speaking there in April 2014. The tip? If you’re a Financial Planning Association member struggling to find plain language to explain a technical term, ask your colleagues on FPA Connect for help.

If you’re not an FPA member, tap other organizations or social networks.

Plain language is more powerful

As I’ve said earlier, “Simple language helps your readers, even when they understand technical terms.”

For less sophisticated readers, technical terms block their understanding of your message. You may lose them as soon as they see jargon.

Standard references may fall short

You have resources to help you restate complex terms in plain language. Sources like Investopedia, InvestorWords, and the Morningstar Investing Glossary.

However, sometimes those sources fall short. They may lack the terms you need. This is when asking others for help can save the day.

Ask your peers for help

“How can I handle a complex technical term like ____?” asked a participant in my Colorado FPA presentation on “Writing Effective Emails and Letters.” It was a tough one. I had no idea how to simplify it on the spot.

However, an audience member—I think it was Carol—chimed in with a plain language equivalent. When you’re stumped like this, you typically won’t be in a room of people who can help. However, it sounds as if FPA Connect, a private social media community for FPA members can fill that role for you.

During the announcement phase of the meeting, I’d heard Carol urge members to check out FPA Connect. Both she and Joe Clemens told stories of how FPA Connect had helped them find answers to questions that might have stumped them otherwise. I believe they posted their questions online, and then waited for responses to roll in. It sounds as if FPA Connect would be a great place to say, “How can I handle a complex technical term like ____?”

I’ve done something similar myself. I’ve posted technical terms in LinkedIn’s “Financial Writing/Marketing Communications” group, asking for help in identifying plain-language equivalents. It usually works.

Has this worked for you?

If this has worked for you, please share your experience in the “Comments” section. I enjoy learning from you.

Image courtesy of Marin / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Confessions of a lousy writer—and 6 tips for you

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I was a lousy writer. It’s true. I wince when I read selections from my Ph.D. thesis, Bureaucracy and Politics in the 1930s: The Career of Goto Fumio.

Goto Fumio

Goto Fumio, the subject of my Ph.D. thesis

Wordy sentences and examples of the passive voice abound. However, over the many years since I earned my doctorate from Harvard, I’ve revamped my style, using techniques that you, too, can adopt.

1. Get someone to edit you

It’s hard for most people to identify their writing’s weaknesses. That’s why it’s so valuable to have someone edit you. My writing improved the most in the 1990s, when I was a staff reporter for Dalbar’s Mutual Fund Market News (now Money Management Executive). I had the luxury of being edited by professionals. If you work with a professional editor, look for patterns in the changes they make to your text. If certain corrections or changes occur repeatedly, you can create a checklist that you can apply yourself to future drafts. You’ll find a sample checklist, the “Blog Post Review Checklist” in my book, Financial Blogging: How to Write Powerful Posts That Attract Clients.

If a professional editor isn’t in your budget, consider asking colleagues, family members, friends, or even clients for feedback. Members of your target audience can help you assess whether your content appeals to them.

2. Take writing classes

Take a writing class—any kind of writing class. I’ve never taken a journalism or financial writing class. However, I’ve taken many adult education classes on writing essays, memoir, and even poetry in the adult ed programs of Boston, Cambridge, and Newton, Mass. These classes helped me learn how to organize my writing, write more economically, and use words with greater power. You might wonder at my inclusion of poetry on my list, but those classes remind me of how important each word is in my writing.

You may be able to find business writing classes, especially if you look at a local college that offers business administration classes. On June 26, 2014, I’ll lead a webinar on “How to Write Investment Commentary People Will Read,” shortly after presenting on that topic to the Boston Security Analysts Society on June 17. I have taught “How to Write Blog Posts People Will Read: Class for Financial Advisors” in addition to presentations on investment commentary, email, and other topics.

The rise of online instruction means that you should be able to find a class no matter where you live.

3. Write a lot

The more you write, the better you’ll become, especially if you get your writing critiqued. One benefit of blogging is that it gives you an incentive to write and publish frequently.

4. Read and analyze other people’s writing

When you read and enjoy other people’s work, take the time to figure out what you like about it. Is it their catchy titles and headings? The way they hit their readers’ hot spots? Their streamlined prose?

You can also learn from analyzing pieces that you dislike. These examples can yield a “don’t” list for you. Avoiding terrible mistakes is worthwhile.

Classes, which I mentioned above, are one way to get practice critiquing other people’s work constructively. Another way is to join a writing group, where members take turns giving and receiving feedback. My book, Financial Blogging: How to Write Powerful Posts That Attract Clients  came from my creative writing group. I don’t know how I would have finished my book without group members’ encouragement and feedback. Plus, I found my book’s project manager in the group.

5. Read about writing

While learning by doing is most powerful, you can also learn by reading about writing techniques. I recommend books on this blog. I also blog about techniques. While my monthly newsletter usually includes a writing tip, you may also enjoy my “Weekly Tip,” which includes just one communications or marketing tip from my archives. You can subscribe or adjust your subscription settings. In addition, you will find step-by-step instructions for writing blog posts in my Financial Blogging book.

6. Experiment

Take risks. Experiment with writing using techniques and formats you’ve never used before. You’re bound to learn something from the results.

What else works?

If you can suggest additional techniques for improving people’s writing, I’d love to hear from you.

Save your trash to feed your blog

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Writers often cram too many ideas and facts into their first drafts. This happens frequently in blog posts. It can even happen in longer pieces, such as white papers, scholarly journal articles, or books. You need to trim the excess to polish your final version. However, you don’t need to lose your extra content forever.

Blog treasures from trash

Let’s say you came up with three great examples and one example with only tangential relevance. If that fourth example tells another story more powerfully, you can use it to start a new blog post.

Sometimes it’s hard to delete information that fascinates you, even if it weakens your final product. I hope that knowing you can use those ideas elsewhere will make it easier for you to trash it, and then use it to feed future blog posts.

Your examples?

Have any of your blog posts started with content you sliced out of other pieces? Please share.

Guide your readers better than this trail guided me

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I got lost. A poorly marked hiking trail sent my husband and me in one wrong direction and then another before we found our way. This reminded me of how writing that lacks trail markers sends readers astray.

The best trail markers for your writing are topic sentences. A strong topic sentence—the first sentence of any paragraph—summarizes the information covered by the rest of the paragraph.

Let me illustrate with an example of bad writing.

Factor #1 affects your investment performance. It can make a big difference in your investment returns. Factor #2 is important, too. So is Factor #3. #2 acts independently of #1 and #3. Factor #3 interacts with Factor #1, but not #2.

This would make more sense with a new topic sentence and some rearranging.

Three factors have a big impact on your investment returns: #1, #2, and #3. #1 and #3 work together, while #2 is independent of them.

To learn more about how topic sentences can help you, read “Quick check for writers, with an economic commentary example.”

If you don’t want to fix examples like this on your own, consider hiring me to help with your firm’s market or portfolio performance commentary. Or check out my June 26 webinar, “How to Write Investment Commentary People Will Read.”

 

Blogging with James B. Stewart of The New York Times

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Looking for ideas on how to structure your blog posts? Newspapers like The New York Times can provide inspiration, as I’ve found with many articles by Floyd Norris and with the column by James B. Stewart that I discuss in this post.

You can find a formula for introducing a blog post in Stewart’s “Why Russia Can’t Afford Another Cold War: Now It’s Part of the Global Economy.”

Stewart’s formula? “This, this, and this have happened. This may seem like X, but actually it’s Y.” This intrigues the readers by overturning their expectations.

Here’s the formula matched with Stewart’s content:

Thing #1: “Russian troops pour over a border.”

Thing #2: “An autocratic Russian leader blames the United States and unspecified ‘radicals and nationalists’ for meddling.”

Thing #3: “A puppet leader pledges fealty to Moscow.”

Mistaken perception: It’s no wonder the crisis in the Ukraine this week drew comparisons to Hungary in 1956 and Czechoslovakia in 1968 or that a chorus of pundits proclaimed the re-emergence of the Cold War.

Today’s reality: “But there’s at least one major difference between then and now: Moscow has a stock market.”

Stewart follows his discussion of people’s mistaken perceptions by introducing the key factor that distinguishes the situation this time. This sets up the article to discuss how his key factor, the stock market, made a difference this time. As the stock market plunged in reaction to Russia’s actions in the Ukraine, it limited the invader’s aggression.

It’s easy for me to imagine how you might apply this to a blog post about a specific investment strategy or asset class. You could list three facts about, say, small cap stocks. Then say “this may make you think these stocks are overvalued (or undervalued). But here’s why that’s not true.”

This format can persuade readers. Just think about all of the investors who bought into the “new paradigm” suggesting that tech stocks were not overvalued prior to the 1998 market correction. Those often followed the approach I described in the preceding paragraph. Please don’t throw out this formula because it led some investors astray. You can harness it for the powers of good.

If you’ve used this technique, please share examples below.

Say “No” to jargon!

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Jargon hurts your communications. I found a great quote about this in Simple: Conquering the Crisis of Complexity by Alan Siegel and Irene Etzkorn.

Here it is:

To connect with people, you have to speak their language. The use of jargon represents a decision on the part of companies and governments to speak in a language that they understand and you don’t.

Jargon can lead to your messages becoming “lost in translation,” as the authors say.

Writing wisdom from novelist Gish Jen

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A conversational writing style helps your blog appeal to readers. But “conversational” does not mean “exactly as in a conversation.”

Novelist Gish Jen says in Why We Write:

When you tell a story in the kitchen to a friend, it is full of infelicities. I try to edit those out in literature but keep the feeling of a story being told.

When you’re blogging, this may mean that you

  • Cut irrelevant details
  • Tighten the structure of your story, making it flow more quickly and logically

Why We Write offers nuggets of advice and inspiration for writers. While it tilts toward fiction, there’s something for everyone.

 

Disclosure: If you click on the Amazon link in this post and then buy something, I will receive a small commission. I only link to books in which I find some value for my blog’s readers.