One of the fears that keeps some would-be business bloggers from getting started is writing ability - specifically, fear that one’s writing isn’t good enough for regular blogging. It’s true that there are a lot of people who aren’t great writers in the business world, but who nonetheless have something interesting to say that’s useful to readers. How do you get past this?
There’s a good post about one aspect of this at ProBlogger: finding your voice.
Voice is the distinct sound/feeling your words create in a reader’s mind. Voice is what makes your writing unique. Voice can be changed, massaged, enhanced, and even manufactured. One of my favorite blogs is fakesteve.blogspot.com. Ever heard of it? Dan Lyons blogs as a caricature of Apple CEO Steve Jobs. The voice comes across as acerbic, neurotic, arrogant, narcissistic, dripping with irony, and just plain hilarious.
Fake Steve is unique, and more importantly, his voice makes reading Apple news compelling and fun. In fact, it’s more than compelling. It’s addictive. Several hundred thousand fans visit each month, and Fake Steve’s voice is what brings them in.
There are some good tips for finding your voice there; have a look.
Voice is one of the hardest things to get right for people who are not comfortable writing. We’ve all had colleagues who can sit in a room with us and tell us what they think in ways that are clear and compelling, but who then write an email that sounds stilted or confusing.
This is important to think about when blogging, because blogging is a medium where voice is more important - and conversely, where readers are more forgiving of other writing mistakes. You can get away with a few bad word choices or grammatical problems in blogging much more easily than you can in your web copy or a brochure or a presentation. (Not that you should, but readers are more forgivin.) But if you don’t have your own voice - if your blog reads like it was written by committee - it just won’t work.
I’d add a tip to those offered in the ProBlogger piece for those having trouble with voice: if you’re having trouble finding your voice, try dictating, and then get some help. Many people have trouble writing in their own voice; few people have trouble speaking that way. Start a blog entry to saying it aloud, and then get someone to edit it for you.
A good editor - who may be a professional, or just someone in your circle with the right skills - can preserve the authentic voice of your spoken word and clean it up so it makes sense in written form. (Most things that are dictated, unfortunately, don’t transfer to the written word without a bit of editing.) Then go back and read the final result, and keep it in mind the next time you write something.
As for those other mistakes - the ones I still make myself after a lifetime of writing! - I’m not giving you a pass on them. If there are enough of them that you sound like an amateur, have someone proof and edit for you. Your blogging needs to be in your own voice, but that doesn’t mean someone can’t fix the mistakes for you. A little roughness may actually work for you, but a lot will make you sound confused. Get some help if you need it, there’s no shame in that.