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How This Book Is OrganizedAs the author, naturally I’m happy if you read the whole book in the sequenceI created for it and build your skills step by step. However, you can equallychoose to dip into chapters and sections as you need them or the spirit movesyou. Use the table of contents or index to find what you want and after you’rethere, you may see options for delving further into subjects elsewhere in thebook.I organize the book into six parts.Part 1: Winning with WritingThis part gives you the whole groundwork for writing everything well.Discover a planning structure that helps you strategize your message in everymedium and a set of techniques for writing it the best possible way. Applypractical approaches to edit and revise your own work, which empower youto fine-tune your writing and enjoy the process more.Part 2: Applying Your Skills to Business Messagesand DocumentsEmail and letters remain important communication staples. Everydaymessaging helps you build your business relationships and professional imagewhile accomplishing your day-to-day goals. More formal business materialslike reports and proposals can be turning-point opportunities. This part showsyou how to identify your own writing problems and correct them, andpractice a thinking structure that lets you find your best content every time.Part 3: Writing to Present Yourself EffectivelyStrategic thinking based on writing helps you succeed in person as well as inmedia. This part shows you the how-to you need to create effective elevatorspeeches and presentations, find and craft your personal story, produce video,and develop talking points to guide you in face-to-face situations, plus tipsand techniques for the job hunt: résumés, cover letters, and networkingmessages.Part 4: Evolving Your Writing for Online MediaContent is king but today’s online reader and consumer have infinite

choices, and you need your contributions to engage quickly and deliversubstance. Writing is the cornerstone of online media. This part shows youhow to adapt your writing style for digital readers, adopt effective techniques,and plan and build blogs and websites. This part also shows you how tocreate a social media program to build your audience, reputation, authority,and networks.Part 5: Extending Your Writing SkillsBoth in-house workers and independents — business owners, consultants,and freelancers — benefit from thinking like entrepreneurs. This part coversthe tools of persuasion, marketing yourself, pitching the media,communicating with teams and bosses, and writing tough messages whenyou’re the boss.Part 6: The Part of TensMany readers find this section the most fun section of the For Dummies bookseries. Look here for ten punchy ideas to advance your career with writing,how to produce quality video, and how to energize your résumé.Icons Used in This BookTo help you focus on what’s most important and move it into memory, look tothe icons.These are practical ideas and techniques you can put to workimmediately — and amaze yourself with good results!This icon keys you in to guidelines and strategies to absorb and usefor everything you write.This icon signals thin ice, don’t take the risk! Observe these cautions

to avoid endangering your business, image, or cause.You’ll also find sections that begin with, Try This:. Why leave all the workto me? Take these opportunities to try your own hand or apply an idea.Nothing builds your skills like practice — and I think you’ll enjoy it, and feelmore confident.Beyond the BookIn addition to what you’re reading now, this book also comes with a freeaccess-anywhere Cheat Sheet that gives you even more pointers on how towrite effectively in the business world. To get this Cheat Sheet, simply go towww.dummies.com and search for “Business Writing For Dummies CheatSheet” in the Search box.Where to Go from HereStarting at the beginning gives you a foundation that applies to everythingyou write. But if you prefer diving right in for help on a specific challenge, byall means do so. The advice may suggest other sections for more depth andyou can follow up as you choose.Everyone learns differently. Grown-ups enjoy the advantage of knowing theirown learning style. Furthermore, we all have our own writing problems torecognize and address. I tell you freely that I have my own, and many of theexamples of transforming blah wording to a more powerful version comefrom editing my own first drafts. To be most useful, I offer choices —different ways to identify problems and improve everything you write.Build a personal repertoire of techniques that work for you, then take thistoolkit on the road with you. Doing so brings you a more successful journey,new confidence, and a lot more fun along the way.

Part 1Winning with Writing

IN THIS PART Learn the core elements of good business writing to solve your mostpressing communication challenges.See how a goal-plus-audience strategy will never fail you, no matterhow hard the writing challenge seems.Learn how you can make people care about your message byconnecting with your reader, highlighting the benefits, and showingthem “what’s-in-it-for-me.”Understand how to write for readability and impact in today’s businessworld using the tools of writing — words, sentences, and structure —to say what you mean in a way most likely to earn respect, support,and agreement.Learn how to switch into the editor’s role and fix common writingproblems so that your messages accomplish what you want.

Chapter 1Make Writing Your Not-So-SecretWeaponIN THIS CHAPTERRising above the pack with good writingUnderstanding the three imperatives of strategic writingUsing an easy structure to plan everything you writeWriting successfully for print, online, visual, and spoken mediaDelivering your message well and being heard. What could be moreimportant in today’s world of over-communication?If your career ladder involves applying for jobs, you need strong résumés,letters, and face-to-face skills. To earn a promotion, your everydaycommunication must signal your reliability, judgment, and resourcefulness. Ifyou run your own business, or work as a consultant or other professional, Ibet your success depends on proposals and presentations. And today,whatever our aspirations, most of us want to create an effective onlinepresence. We want to team successfully with others and advocate for our ownneeds and ideas.The foundation for all of this, of course, is writing! Surprisingly fewpeople realize this. When they think about polishing their communicationskills, most people jump straight to presentations. Knowing how to give agood speech may seem sexier than writing, but it leapfrogs past the reality:Even a 20-second elevator pitch needs to be written before it’s spoken. Goodwebsites, videos, Twitter campaigns, blogs, and most other communicationtools start with the written word.There’s a simple reason for this. Human beings think in language. No matterhow big a role visuals play in a communication “product,” whether print ordigital, writing provides the indispensable support structure for planning. And

if even a few words appear in the ultimate message, they must be just theright ones.In this chapter, I highlight the core elements of good business writing andintroduce a planning structure that enables you to figure out what to say andhow to say it in just about every circumstance. This step-by-step approach towriting works for every communication platform with just a little adaptationfor each one. You’ll find that improving your writing offers even morebenefits than you may suspect, and that you’ve already begun to build thefoundation for it. In later chapters, I show you how to apply these ideas to allyour business communication.Putting Good Writing to Work for YouCan you imagine building relationships without language? Today we initiatemost relationships — especially in business — through the written word. Inperson contact may follow, or it may not. When the first contact is successful,we continue to rely on writing to build the connection and collaborate.From everyday email to reports, letters, and digital platforms, today’sworking world runs on writing. Therefore, the rewards of good writing havenever been more extraordinary. The Internet enables us to reach beyond ourpersonal geographic and social reach to almost anyone we want to sell to,collaborate with, or learn from. Almost anyone with time and dedication canstart a business and sell a product or service, post her artwork, publish a book,or establish his authority as an expert on a subject.There’s just one catch. Because anyone can do this, unless you are a narrowspecialist, the competition is overwhelming.Consider these statistics:112.5 billion business email messages are sent daily. (That’s 122messages per user!)There are 130 million active Twitter users, and 303 million tweets per dayare sent.The Internet holds 1 billion websites.There are 300 million blogs.

Of course, you’re not competing with all of these email messages, tweets,websites, and blogs, or reading more than an infinitesimal fraction of themyourself in each medium. But people today — just like you — are extremelyselective about what they choose to read because so many options vie fortheir attention.There are few captive audiences in today’s world. Check how manymessages you’ve recently received that you must read. Even if you holdtop-down authority, there’s no assurance that your message will be read.Attention, along with respect, must be earned. Writing a message thatsomeone will actually read is an achievement. Writing messages thatpeople will act on demands not just writing that is clear and direct, butalso content that is well thought-out and framed to the reader’s ownperspective. In other words, today’s business writing needs to bestrategic.What is strategic writing? Planned communication that achieves a set ofgoals — your goals, and often the goals of your employer and clients. Thegood news is that you already have a solid base for knowing how to writestrategically. You’re in command of the three imperatives:Your subject: You are invested in your field and possess in-depthknowledge of it.Your audience: You know who your audience is, such as prospectiveemployers, coworkers, and target markets for your business.Your goal: You know what you want, now and in the bigger-picturefuture.Here are some of the things you may not know yet:How to choose the right communication tool for the jobHow to capture and retain reader attentionHow to make people care about your messageHow to select the right content to make your case

How to use writing techniques that make your material persuasive andconvincingHow to use every single thing you write to build relationships andadvance your causeHow to understand other people’s perspective and predict their responsesHow to sharpen your ear and eye so you can spot your own writingproblems and fix themI show you how to do all these things in this book.Notice that almost every item in this list relates to the thinking part ofwriting, not the technical part. Master the art of thinking your contentthrough and you move way ahead of the competition. But of course, thetechnical side of writing — how you use language — matters, too. Icover that as well. You’ll find a whole resource of practical tips forimproving your sentences, word choice, and organization. Instead ofgrammar lessons, I give you a broad resource of practical tips forimproving your sentences, word choice, and organization. Try them outand discover the techniques that work best for you.Let’s start with a planning structure that will help you figure out what youwant to say and how to say it. You may be surprised at how much better yourmessages are received, and how much more often you get a positive response,once you start applying it.Planning and Structuring EveryMessageFaced with a blank page and something to accomplish, many people freeze atthe first question: Where do I start? The answer? Start with the threecomponents of strategic writing. You already know them:Your subject: What you’re writing aboutYour audience: Whom you’re writing to

Your goal: What you specifically want to accomplishTo create a good message and get the result you want from your reader, youneed to think about all of these things more systematically than you ordinarilymight.You must “read” your audience in an organized way — I show youhow. And you benefit from visualizing your goal in a broad way.Consider that for almost every message you write, you actually have awhole set of goals beyond the immediate: communicating your ownprofessional image, for example. When you combine your knowledge ofthe audience with your set of goals, it becomes easy to translate whatyou know about the subject into content that supports your message.For example, suppose you want to ask your supervisor for a plum assignmentyou see on the horizon. You can simply write:Jane, I’d like to present myself as a candidate for the lead role on theCrystal Project. You know my work and qualifications. I’ll reallyappreciate the opportunity, and I’ll do a great job. Thanks, JakeThis is maybe okay insofar as it’s clear and contains no obvious errors. Butit’s definitely not compelling. All Jane learns from the message is that Jakewants the opportunity and thinks he’s qualified.Jake would fare better if he first looked at his own goals more in depth.Perhaps he wants a chance to:Exercise more responsibilityShow off his capabilities and be noticedExpand his know-how in regard to the project’s subjectAdd a management credential to his résuméBut he also has the longer term to consider. Jake almost certainly will find ituseful to:

Strengthen his position for future special assignmentsRemind his boss of his good track recordBuild his image as a capable, reliable, resourceful leaderBuild toward a promotion or higher-level job in his current organizationor elsewhereFrom this vantage point, Jake can see the pitch itself as a building block forhis overall career ambitions, which calls for a better message than theperfunctory one he dashed off. He must think through the actual assignmentdemands and how his skills match up. Then there’s Jane — his audience — toconsider. What qualifications does she, the decision-maker, most value? Whatdoes she care about?After some thought, Jake may come up with a list like this:Job requires: Planning skills; ability to meet deadlines; knowledge ofXYZ systems; experience in intra-departmental coordination; goodjudgment under pressureJane values: Collaborative teaming; people skills; department reputation;effective presentation. She is weak in systems planning and insecure withnew technology.This bit of brainstorming helps Jake produce a blueprint for persuasivecontent. His email can briefly cite his proven track record in terms of the jobrequirements, his ability to deliver results as a team leader, his awareness thatsuccess will enhance the department’s reputation, and that he’ll use hisexcellent presentation skills to ensure this result.The weaknesses he pinpoints for Jane give Jake another avenue for presentinghimself as the best choice. He can suggest a planning system he’ll use tomake the most of staff resources and/or a specific way to incorporate neweasy-to-use technology. These aspects of his message are likely to catchJane’s attention.All Jake’s points must be true, needless to say. I don’t suggest ever

making up qualifications, but rather, that you take the trouble tocommunicate the best of what is real and what matters in a particularsituation.Further, never assume people understand your capabilities orremember your achievements, even if they’re colleagues who know youwell. Other people don’t have time to put you in perspective. They’rethinking about themselves. That’s why doing it yourself has such power.Even if Jake doesn’t get the assignment, writing a good email contributes tohis longer-range goals of presenting himself as ready, willing, and able to takeon new challenges and to be seen as more valuable.What Jake’s message illustrates is how to use a simple structure foreverything you write. My shorthand for this is simply Goal Audience Content. When you define what you want to accomplish with aspecific message, and think about the specific person you’re writing to,content decisions help make themselves.When you use this structured thinking to plan your messages, whether they’reemail messages or proposals or anything in between, you move far toward thereal heart of good writing — real and relevant substance. Writing is not asystem for manipulating words, and don’t ever expect it to camouflage a lackof thought, knowledge, or understanding. Good writing is good thinkingpresented clearly, concisely, and transparently in ways that make sense toyour readers.I make you a rash promise: For every fraction you improve your writing,you’ll improve your thinking along with it. Plus, you will improve yourability to understand other people, which will help you build betterrelationships and achieve what you want more often.Chapter 2 gives you an in-depth demonstration of this planning

structure and shows you how to translate it into successful messages.While you may pick and choose which sections of the book to read anddraw upon them at need, I encourage you to invest in Chapter 2. It givesyou the entire foundation for deciding what to say in any circumstance.Remember that the ideas apply equally to communications that appear tobe dominated by visuals or spoken language.The other essential groundwork for successful writing is how to say what youwant. Chapters 3, 4, and 5 demonstrate common-sense techniques thatprofessionals use to spot problems and fix them with the least effort.Try This: To quickly upgrade anything you write, use the say-it-alouddiagnosis. When you read your own copy aloud (or whisper it to yourself ifyou’re not alone), you get immediate signals that something isn’t working orcan work better. You may be forcing your sentences into a sing-song cadencethat denotes awkward construction, unnecessary words, and overly longsentences. You may hear repetitive sounds or inappropriate

Business Writing For Dummies To view this book's Cheat Sheet, simply go to www.dummies.com and search for "Business Writing For Dummies Cheat Sheet" in the Search box. Table of Contents Cover Introduction About This Book Foolish Assumptions How This Book Is Organized Icons Used in This Book Beyond the Book Where to Go from Here