Susan B. Weiner's Blog, page 73

Why I like some tweets more than others–and the lessons for you

How can you write tweets that attract readers, retweets, and clicks? If you’re like most folks on Twitter, you’ve wondered about this topic. Here are lessons from some tweets I recently enjoyed.

By the way, if this leaves you with questions about Twitter, register for the RegEd webinar on Twitter. On Thursday, December 12, I’ll be a guest of RegEd’s Blane Warrene, along with Pat Allen of Rock the Boat Marketing.

1. Deliver content that helps the reader.

Everybody’s looking out for themselves. If your tweets deliver content that helps people, they’ll attract attention.

The following tweet from HootSuite caught my eye because I haven’t always been successful in getting help from companies on Twitter. The tweet made me click and share. The words “get what you want” caught my eye. The words “kicking and tweeting” made me think this might be a fun tweet to read.

Kicking and tweeting to get what you want: http://t.co/jsxa21rUNd How to get better social media customer service

— HootSuite (@hootsuite) December 2, 2013

Tweets that promise tips also appeal.

7 Non-SEO Tips for Ranking Well in Google Search http://t.co/8r0PtSNRhK

— Stephanie Sammons (@StephSammons) December 2, 2013

Good tips for any advisors considering a book! "6 lessons from my book writing experience" http://t.co/LafpTtWZe9 via @SusanWeiner

— MichaelKitces (@MichaelKitces) December 2, 2013

2. Start tweets with keywords that interest the reader.

Readers’ eyes tend to fix on the first two words of a line, so that’s a powerful position for keywords that appeal to your readers.

As I contemplate publishing more books, the term “e-book” caught my eye in the following tweet.

E-Books Hold Tight to Features of Their Print Predecessors http://t.co/Uv76TiZHv9

— NYT Business (@nytimesbusiness) December 2, 2013

3. Ask questions and engage with readers.

My tweet of “How Do You Measure Success And Quality In A Financial Planning Firm?”—the title of a blog post by Michael Kitces—sparked a multi-person conversation. Much of this was probably due to Michael’s posing a question in his title.

Don’t forget: If people respond to your tweets, it’s important for you to respond.

How Do You Measure Success And Quality In A Financial Planning Firm? – http://t.co/WpJ7hLmeih via @BillWinterberg @MichaelKitces

— Susan Weiner, CFA (@susanweiner) December 2, 2013

4. Promise interesting links from reputable sources.

Tweets with links get shared more often than those without. I think it’s because there’s the promise of more content than can be squeezed into 140 characters. It helps when the tweets are shared by reputable sources. It’s even better when those reputable sources have written the material at the link.

What happens to your digital life after death? http://t.co/1Arh5bAz14

— PewResearch FactTank (@FactTank) December 2, 2013

5. Write sensibly.

Here are some rules that should help.

Write tweets that run 120 characters or less. This means I don’t have to edit or rewrite your tweets to share them.
Write grammatically, within reason. Terrible typos will distract your readers and undermine your credibility. However, readers will forgive a little fat-fingered keyboarding. They can also handle an abbreviation or two. However, you’ll lose readers like me if you spew a series of the abbreviations that seem common in texting.
Give your reader a reason to read. It could be a download, a question, or simply your lively personality. Referring to “you” can help, as in the following tweet from Vanguard.

You see them every year… but how well do you really know them? Get to know your #TaxForms: http://t.co/hgr90xaGfT

— Vanguard (@Vanguard_Group) December 2, 2013

Some Twitter tips that I mostly ignore, but you may find helpful

Use hashtags—The right hashtag can increase the number of people who find you. I’ve found this especially helpful when I’ve live-tweeted conferences that have hashtags specifically for the purpose of following the conference.
Ask for retweets—Asking for retweets reportedly boosts the number of retweets. This is okay in moderation, but I generally prefer to see which tweets take off on their own. What I don’t like is when people repeatedly send tweets that mention my Twitter name solely to get me to see their tweets. This seems spammy.

 What have I missed?

I’m curious to learn your best tips for writing powerful tweets.

 

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Copyright 2013 by Susan B. Weiner

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This content may not be reposted without the author’s written permission.

The post Why I like some tweets more than others–and the lessons for you appeared first on Susan Weiner's Blog on Investment Writing.

Old vs. young for your blog

Looking for a new angle on a classic investment or financial topic? Try the following suggestion from Ray Peter Clark’s Help! for Writers:

Interview the oldest person you know, and the youngest.

I can imagine a nonagenarian and a child would have very different perspectives about topics such as “Why save money?” or “What should you spend money on?”

You might use your interview results in different ways.

Select quotes to enliven your article.
Use a quote or opinion as your article’s starting point.
Tell your interviewee’s story to make a point.
Generalize about the wisdom of youth or old age.
Compare and contrast the positions of young and old.
Point out the weaknesses in an opinion

Have you tried this?

If you’ve used this technique, I’d like to learn about your success with it. Please comment.

 

Image courtesy of Timeless Photography/ FreeDigitalPhotos.net

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Copyright 2013 by Susan B. Weiner

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Winston Churchill’s lesson for speakers and writers

Winston Churchill was an outstanding speaker. Here’s what he said about his preparation.

If you want me to speak for two minutes, it will take me three weeks of preparation, it will take me a week to prepare. If you want me to speak for an hour, I am ready now.

—Winston Churchill

The bottom line? To speak concisely requires more preparation than rambling. The same is true for writing that packs a punch in a small space.

I’d like to acknowledge Terri Sjodin’s Small Message, Big Impact: The Elevator Speech Effect for drawing this quote to my attention.

Image courtesy of the British Government / Wikimedia Commons

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Copyright 2013 by Susan B. Weiner

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Ammo for your plain-language battle with compliance

“Our compliance officer makes us write like this.” That’s the complaint I sometimes hear when I push financial professionals to write better. If you’d like to push back, consider  the point made by Joseph Kimble in Writing for Dollars, Writing to Please: The case for plain language in business, government, and law. Kimble is a lawyer who has taught legal writing for 30 years at Thomas Cooley Law School.

Lawyers and compliance professionals say that legal jargon is necessary to protect your firm. However, Kimble suggests that jargon may be part of the problem. How’s that? Readers often fail to understand legalese and other jargon. As Kimble says, “…this in turn will be more likely to engender disputes and litigation that never should have happened in the first place.” This makes me think of some of my pet peeves, such as the use of “mitigate.”

Plain language can be a lawyer’s friend. “If anything, plain language is more precise than traditional legal and official writing because it uncovers the ambiguities and gaps and errors that traditional style, with all its excesses, tends to hide,” says Kimble. I agree.

However, even when compliance professionals let writers use plain language in the body of a communication, they may insist on technical terms in the disclosures as a form of protection for the company. Kimble’s book suggests that technical terms are a small part of legal documents—and that would presumably include documents governed by FINRA and the SEC. Those bodies may require certain information, but they don’t normally require specific wording. Rather, legalese just gets copied from old forms and models. In fact, the SEC favors plain language. Kimble mentions the SEC’s plain-English rules and Plain English Handbook as one of the “historical highlights” of the plain language movement.

If you’re looking for evidence of the benefits of plain language, 60+ pages of Kimble’s book are devoted to evidence of how plain language is “saving time and money” as well as “pleasing and persuading readers.” His book is among the sources I mention in “Seven Ways to Talk Your Financial Execs Out of Jargon and Bad Writing” on the MarketingProfs blog.

 

Disclosure: I received a free copy of this book after mentioning it in another blog post. 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.

 

 

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Copyright 2013 by Susan B. Weiner

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This content may not be reposted without the author’s written permission.

The post Ammo for your plain-language battle with compliance appeared first on Susan Weiner's Blog on Investment Writing.

6 lessons from my book writing experience

Thinking about writing a book?

Before you start, please consider six lessons from my writing experience with Financial Blogging: How to Write Powerful Posts That Attract Clients. They’ll make your writing process flow more smoothly. If you enjoy this post, I’ll follow up with posts about my book’s production and marketing.

1. Decide on traditional vs. self-publishing

Your decision about whether to seek a traditional publisher or to self-publish will affect your writing process. Historically, the traditional route requires writing a proposal, finding an agent, and then seeking a publisher. To attract an agent and publisher requires having a “platform”—a readymade audience of people who’ll buy your books—in addition to expertise and a strong proposal. The platform is important because today’s publishers don’t do much to market books they don’t see as blockbusters.

I toyed with the idea of going the agent-publisher route, even though I had a strong hunch that I’d self-publish because of my book’s niche. I liked the idea that someone else would manage the production process. Plus, it would be cool to say “I have an agent.” I signed up to meet with three agents at the April 2011 member-only pitch sessions at the annual conference of the American Society of Journalists and Authors.

Surprisingly, the agent whom I met – only one of the three meetings panned out—asked me to send him my proposal and sample chapter. I floated up to Cloud Nine. By the way, here’s a link to my 2011 one-pager.

Unfortunately, my proposal and sample chapter didn’t get results from the agent. He responded once via email, but then ignored my email and telephone follow-ups. I wish he could have said, “Sorry, your book isn’t right for me.”

Anyway, the reason I stress the traditional vs. self-publishing decision is its impact on your writing process. If you go the traditional route, you should wait to write your entire book until after you snare an agent—and probably after the two of you land your publisher. For advice on pursuing an agent and publisher, here are some sources:

“Agents and book proposals” by Pat McNees
Publishers Marketplace 
Chuck Sambuchino’s Guide to Literary Agents Blog 

If you’re self-publishing, you can start writing whenever you feel ready.

2. Test your concept

If you’d like people to buy your book instead of simply accepting it as a free giveaway, you should test your target market’s interest in your book idea.

If you write a heavily trafficked blog that’s narrowly focused on your book topic, that’s a good indicator of interest. You can also look at your blog’s statistics or run a poll on your blog (or in your e-newsletter) to refine the focus of your book.

Presentations and classes are another great way to test your book idea. My book actually grew out of a class that I taught. I figured that since advisors were willing to pay a three-figure fee to take a class with me, there’d probably be interest in a book, too.

3. Develop a plan

My plan was to take my class notes and write them up, paced by the need to provide drafts on the schedule of my creative writing group. To write your book as quickly as possible, you’ll benefit from starting with a

Outline or other structure for your book
Schedule for hitting milestones in your book creation process

Having a plan for your content before you write will allow you to write more efficiently and identify the focus of each chapter in advance. This will prevent the painful task of rearranging it later.

If you don’t have an outline, consider mind mapping your book’s structure. That’s how I figured out the structure of my blogging class, which became the foundation of my book.

Creating a schedule or some form of accountability will help discipline you to work on your book. You, like me, may find it hard to squeeze your book into your daily routine. A target of one chapter per X number of weeks may help.

4. Get support

Get whatever support you need to make your book project easier.

The Nobscot Niblets, the creative writing group that I participated in, was invaluable. At our twice-a-month meetings, they gave me deadlines, critiques, and encouragement. Without them, I would never have started my book. Nor would I have finished it as soon as I did.

You may be able to find a local writing group through MeetUp.com. That’s how the Niblets started, though I was brought in by a friend.

If groups aren’t for you, a writing coach or accountability buddy may help. I’ve discussed the buddy approach in “How a blogging buddy can help your investment or financial planning blog.”

5. Test your material

It’s hard for you to experience your book through your readers’ eyes, so ask others to read your book to give you feedback. This could mean reading individual chapters along the way and then reading the complete manuscript.

The Nobscot Niblets did both kinds of reading for me. They convinced me that I needed to add some topics, such as compliance, that I wasn’t eager to cover. Their reading of the complete manuscript prompted some changes in my chapter order, in addition to numerous tweaks.

I also enlisted a writing instructor and several members of my target audience to read my book. Their reading from different perspectives tested the effectiveness of my book.

6. Manage your images

Images, tables, and other graphic elements may make your message easier to understand, but they’re also a big pain when you format your book.

To minimize the pain, follow these rules:

Only include graphic elements that contribute significantly to your readers’ understanding. I cut quite a few screenshots from my book during its production phase.
Snap any photos at a high resolution. Unfortunately, I had no idea when I took the two photos in my book that I’d need them for the book. They look okay, but not great.
Limit your use of computer screenshots because their resolution typically isn’t very good. Substitute typed text for screenshots when possible. Screenshots can work, but they may not look as crisp as the rest of your book.
Keep your graphic elements small in terms of height and width if possible, assuming that you’re planning to make your book available in an electronic format. A table that looks great printed on 8 ½” x 11” piece of paper won’t display well on a tiny screen.
Limit special formatting. In my book, the two-column formatted text that needed to line up was a royal pain during book production.

These are my best tips to help you complete a draft of your book.

Interested in learning my tips for turning your manuscript into a published work? Let me know.

 

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Copyright 2013 by Susan B. Weiner

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This content may not be reposted without the author’s written permission.

The post 6 lessons from my book writing experience appeared first on Susan Weiner's Blog on Investment Writing.

How can you share a personal story, yet still draw in readers?

I’m a big fan of showing personality in your blog posts. Sharing your stories helps you do that. But if you start off with “I,” you risk seeming self-absorbed.

I like how a Vanguard blog post tackled this challenge. It opened with “Do you remember when you first encountered the World Wide Web?” That’s a question that just about any adult can relate to. It took me back to memories of a clunky DOS PC. I imagine that even young adults today have a relevant memory, although that will be less true of kids raised with smartphones and iPads.

Only after raising that question did the author, Andy Clarke, dive into his own Internet story from 1993.

If you’d like to see how Clarke did it, read “The adoption of a great idea.”

Of course, there are other ways to show personality without alienating your readers. I discussed some of them in “How to add personality and warmth to your financial writing–Part one” and “Part two.” Please chime in if you have ideas you’d like to add to the discussion.

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Copyright 2013 by Susan B. Weiner

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This content may not be reposted without the author’s written permission.

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Content marketing: Why the heck am I doing this?

I don’t need a blog or social media to earn my living as a financial writer. Heck, I don’t even need a website. I have friends who earn nice incomes through one-on-one networking and other traditional marketing. I see how I could have achieved something similar. Yet, here I am, spending hours on unpaid content marketing that won’t lead directly to work. This includes a blog, social media outposts (Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Google+ profile and Google+ page), mini e-books, and my book, Financial Blogging: How to Write Powerful Posts That Attract Clients.

Sometimes I wonder why I subject myself to the endless “to do” list that this marketing imposes. There are several reasons.

1. Self-expression that influences people

Writing helps me to process information. I can figure out what I think through the process of writing. This is particularly true of pieces like “Q&A format for articles: Good or bad?” which I wrote to figure out why I dislike Q&As.

However, I wouldn’t write as much as I do if I lacked an audience. I’m pleased that my readers enjoy my writing and say that I help them to improve their writing and marketing. True confession: this boosts my ego. However, I also like to think that I’m contributing to raising the quality of financial communications. I was especially pleased when one person said, “I hope this goes viral,” after reading my guest post, “Seven Ways to Talk Your Financial Execs Out of Jargon and Bad Writing,” which appeared on the MarketingProfs blog.

2. “Water cooler”

As a solopreneur, I don’t have many conversations during a typical business day. Comments on my blog posts and other social media exchanges fill a gap. As an introverted writer, I’m more comfortable mulling over my responses and typing them out instead of talking.

It’s surprising how much of a connection I can feel as a result of online exchanges. There are folks whom I think of as friends whom I have never met in person.

3. Business development

Blogging and social media haven’t delivered tons of business to me. I’ve picked up a few clients here and there.

However, the role of social media is increasing. One new client found me after I retweeted his company’s Twitter feed. He then started following my blog. Although I met another new client at a conference, I discovered that he already knew me through my newsletter and social media activity. Both individuals quickly became clients after we started discussing specific projects. I believe they were pre-sold on me, thanks to my content that they’d discovered online.

Even if clients find me through traditional networking, my blog and social media activity help me. I believe that most prospects will do an online search for my name before hiring me. They’ll find plenty of content as a result of that search.

In addition, I believe that my blog and social media play a greater role in selling Financial Blogging: How to Write Powerful Posts That Attract Clients, when compared with their role in reeling in corporate clients for white papers and articles.

What does this mean for you?

I see two lessons for you:

You don’t need to pick up clients directly from blogging or social media for those activities to be worthwhile.
You shouldn’t discount the role of social media in sealing a sale, even if prospects find you using other means.

What do you think? Do you agree with my conclusions? I’m interested in your thoughts.

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Copyright 2013 by Susan B. Weiner

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This content may not be reposted without the author’s written permission.

The post Content marketing: Why the heck am I doing this? appeared first on Susan Weiner's Blog on Investment Writing.

Free and low-cost data visualization tools from an online editor

Data visualization tools were on my mind after hearing Wesley Grubbs, a data visualizer with Pitch Interactive, speak on “Meaningfully Communicating Data with Visualizations” at the CFA Institute’s GIPS conference in Boston on Sept. 19, 2013. Grubbs provided inspiring examples of creativity, but skimped on practical tips. This is why I was delighted to attend “Data visualization on a shoestring” presented by Sharon Machlis, online managing editor, Computerworld, at the ASPBE Boston Boot Camp on Sept. 24, 2013.

If you’re a financial blogger or writer, you’ll find tools that can help to illustrate your content. Machlis’ presentation reviewed practical tools for data visualization. Because she targeted budget-strapped journalists, she focused on free and low-cost tools. She moved from easy-to-use tools to tools that require the ability to write code.

Make Excel charts look better

Machlis suggested tools that can make your Excel charts look better. Chartbuilder sounded like the easiest place to start.

Another option is IBM’s Many Eyes. It is easy to use, said Machlis, but you’ll need to upload your data and make it public, so that’s not likely to appeal to many asset managers or financial advisors.

More data visualization resources

Machlis’ resource list, which I’m sharing with her permission, offers more sophisticated options.

You can also view a version of her complete presentation on “Data visualization on a shoestring.“

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Copyright 2013 by Susan B. Weiner

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This content may not be reposted without the author’s written permission.

The post Free and low-cost data visualization tools from an online editor appeared first on Susan Weiner's Blog on Investment Writing.

Quote of the day on keeping it simple

I’m a big fan of writers using plain English. I urge people to keep their blog posts, articles, and white papers as short as possible.

However, I agree with the following quote from Michael Maslansky’s The Language of Trust.

Simple does not always mean short.

As Maslansky explains, “It is always better to use five words to tell a clear story than use two and keep people confused.”

For example, if you must use a technical term, explain it in a parenthetical comment. Replace “We invest in BRICs” with “We invest in BRIC countries—Brazil, Russia, India, and China.”

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Copyright 2013 by Susan B. Weiner

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Plain English and good writing

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