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About The Author
Kim Phillips is an independent marketing consultant specializing in branding, communication strategy, creative writing and design, online content, email marketing and social media.
The 3 Fastest Ways to Cheapen Your Business Writing.
Posted in Writing - Leave a Comment
One: The Exclamation Point
We’ve all gotten them… emails with subject lines like: Special Sale!!! Three Days Only!!! Don’t Miss It!!! The exclamation point is intended to add emphasis. If everything has emphasis, then nothing does. Look at your latest blog entry, ad, or Facebook post. If there are several exclamation points, take them all out and read it again. If it isn’t compelling without the exclamation points, it won’t be with them, either.
Two: All Caps
From a technical standpoint, type set in all-caps is harder to read than upper and lower case; the eye tires of it quickly. The exception might be a headline like, CANCER CURE FOUND. And in the online world, all-caps is construed as yelling. Instead of adding emphasis, all-caps type usually detracts from readability and is, well, annoying. To be on the safe side, just don’t do it.
Three: Unnecessary Quotation Marks
When not bookending a word-for-word statement, quotation marks can be used to indicate that the words are intended to convey the opposite of their plain meaning. For example, if you say that someone is an “actress,” it means she’s not, or at least not a very good one. So, an ad that promotes The “Best” in Town lets you know it’s probably not too spectacular.
To make your writing really compelling, stop worrying about formatting and tricks. Focus on the words themselves… let them do the talking.
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Tags: writing mistakes