business writing: write today

If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!

Does the idea of writing a proposal fill you with abject fear?

Relax. Proposals are EASY to create. (Really.)

The potent power of proposals has an excellent piece on all the components of a proposal:

1. Executive Summary
2. Current Situation
3. Project Goals
4. Competition
5. Audience
6. Creative & Marketing Strategies
7. Process
8. Fees & Reimbursements
9. Billing & Schedule
10. Conclusion
11. Company Overview
12. Clients
13. Awards

Take the process step by step, and you’ll have your new proposal done and generating new business in no time.

Technorati Tags: business proposal, components of a business proposal

A great way to structure your documents is via the journalist’s inverted pyramid.

If you want your writing read this is the easiest structure. It’s usually the most effective structure too, and your readers will appreciate it, because many (most) business documents seem designed to make reading and understanding a torture.

“Inverted pyramid style” means that you present your most important information early in the document. By the end of the second paragraph, preferably by the end of the first paragraph, the reader should have a clear understanding of the most important information in the document.

Following the most important material, you can either elaborate on this or give additional information.

The easiest way to wrap up is to refer to your opening paragraph in your closing paragraph.

Technorati Tags: business writing, inverted pyramind

When I’m editing my writing, I aim to cut my words by half. You’ll find that if you do the same, your writing will improve.

Strunk (Elements of Style) says:

Vigorous writing is concise. A sentence should contain no unnecessary words, a paragraph no unnecessary sentences, for the same reason that a drawing should have no unnecessary lines and a machine no unnecessary parts. This requires not that the writer make all his sentences short, or that he avoid all detail and treat his subjects only in outline, but that every word tell.

Technorati Tags: editing, concise business writing