Business and Professional Writing: Four Fundamental Elements

Everybody wants to know how to be a better writer. That is a question that's asked over and over again, with many different answers and views. So instead of re-hashing all of those articles and suggestions, I'm going to look at four fundamental elements of writing for business. These four elements are great for business writing, but can also be applied to other writing.

Fundamental Writing Element One: Know Your Audience

This element is probably the most important thing to consider when doing any kind of writing, business or otherwise. You have to be able to effectively communicate with your audience, and speak their language. This may sound like an easy thing to do, and sometimes it can be, but that is not always the case. Take, for example, Tweak's Rants, my MySpace blog:

The writing style I use in those entries is completely different than most of my writing I do for Associated Content. My writing style for Tweak's Rants is a much more informal and personal approach, mixed with a little anger and frustration usually. I can get away with that there because I know my audience. They generally have the same attitudes and beliefs as me, or are open minded enough to enjoy differing opinions, which are not attitudes that are prevalent in business and professional surroundings.

There are questions you should always be asking yourself about your audience to find out what your writing should really be:

Who is my audience? Who is going to be reading this? If you are writing a quick short memo, a proposal to a business executive, or a letter to a customer, your writing style will be different. If it is for somebody within your business, you need to make sure you do not write above, or below, them. Look at what kind of experience your audience has with the subject of your writing, and what position they hold within the company. If you are writing for someone outside the company, a customer for example, you want to make sure you are not using too much technical jargon or business speak. You want them to feel that you know who they are and have thing in common with them.

How many people will be reading my writing? This is a fairly straight-forward question and purpose. If you are just writing a note to a co-worker on the next shift, it will sound and look different than a letter, or even a memo, to a group of executives. The key here is to make sure you can relate to your whole audience, and that you do not just write to a fraction of the complete group.

How well can my audience understand English? This is a key question to ask if you are writing to customers. Just assuming that since your company conducts business within the United States, does not mean that your company's whole customer base speaks English well, or at all. Even if you are writing for people within your company, you need to know who is going to read it. It is possible that executives from other countries or regions will have access to your writing, so you want to make sure they are able to read and understand everything in your writing.

What knowledge level do my readers have about my topic? This goes back to making sure you can relate to your audience and that they can understand what you are telling them. You just have to make sure that you don't talk over their head, or sound like you are talking down to them.

These are just some of the major questions every writer should be asking themselves before they write anything. Once you start writing for business more often, you will know exactly what questions you need to ask yourself, and it will become more of an automatic thought process.

Fundamental Writing Element Two: Know Why You are Writing

If you want to make writing an easier process, and many people do, you have to know what the message that you are trying to convey is. If you are writing for business purposes, there is one key rule that I hear over and over again: Get to the point. In my blog, Tweak's Rants, I know what I want to say, but I have the luxury to jump all over the place and insert jokes all I want. When you are writing professionally, you do not have that luxury. Most business executives and managers are too busy to be reading five pages of a proposal that could have been summed up in one page. If you don't state your purpose quickly, yet clearly, then you have already lost your audience. The only way to do this is to make sure you know exactly what you want to say.

Fundamental Writing Element Three: Building Your Message

So now that you know who you are writing to, and what you want to say, you have to effectively build your message. Remember that good writing is not something that always happens on the first shot. Most people have to build their message. They will start out with a rough draft, but add or change things after asking some questions about their audience. Business writing is a deeper process than other types of writing because your job may depend on this one thing you have written; be it a raise, promotion, or just the image your managers have of you. It takes awhile to build the right message, so take some time until it becomes a more automatic response for you.

Fundamental Writing Element Four: Style and Tone Selection

The style of writing is how something is written. This spans a lot more than business writing or non-business writing. Styles will have to be adapted to fir different messages and audiences, obviously, but knowing exactly what style to choose for your business writing is the tricky part. Unfortunately, there's not a lot I can say here, since each writing task will be different, but I just wanted to make sure this element was something that everybody knew was an important step in the business writing process.

The tone in writing is similar to your actual speaking tone. If you are angry, it will show through; similarly if you are happy or rushed. Word selection is key to setting the tone for your writing. Would you rather say that a customer was 'being mean' or that they were 'displeased'? Since your writing in the business world is a direct reflection of your professional image, you need to make sure you are setting the right tone of each and every writing you do.