Books-Speeches-Publishing

Do You Lose Your Voice When You Write?

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in Books-Speeches-Publishing, Concise writing, Love of writing, Promotional Collateral and Your Voice Inc.

I am not suggesting that you suffer from a strange side effect of writer’s block. I am referring to our tendency to lose our brand identity when we write books, speeches, promotional collateral, opt-in products, website copy, etc. Have you ever read some of your own content months or years later and thought it does not even sound like you? Have you watched one of your keynote presentations and wondered why it did not feel authentic? Have you reviewed your website copy lately and thought, “Is this really me?”

Just for fun, let’s call this phenomenon Writer’s Laryngitis (WL). We will define it as a condition resulting from authors or speakers deviating from their brand, their rhythm, and their personality because they are trying too hard to accommodate their perceptions of their audience.

Are you addressing industry mavens and CEOs and instead of being your clever and engaging self, you end up delivering a stoic and lifeless presentation? What if the demographics of your readers are predominantly male or female, do you get too in touch with your masculine or feminine side in an attempt to establish rapport when in fact your disingenuous tone turns people off?

These may seem like dramatic examples, but on a much smaller scale this happens more often than you realize.

Mild to Severe WL-like symptoms:

You find yourself stuck trying to write about content you coach everyday, or you try to mimic expressions and concepts that do not come easily to you.
You stumble for just the right words to explain your own services and products.
When you receive your own Opt-In product emails each day, are you unable to see your reflection in them?
Your personality resembles slacks and a nice sweater but your correspondence wears a three-piece suit
When listening to your own recorded tele-seminar script you sound more rehearsed than the conversational tone of your in-person consultations
A new client or colleague tells you that based on your previous correspondence and content, you “seem different” in person

In-Home Remedies:

The next time you talk with a potential new client on the phone, record yourself on a digital recorder. Are you explaining your services the same way in print? Chances are your audio explanation was more engaging and persuasive.
Put your promotional collateral and sales letters side-by-side with your web copy and see if they are consistent in tone and messaging
Read your manuscript chapters aloud to yourself. If the words do not flow easily for you, then simplify and replace it with your everyday diction

Professional Treatment:

You may have a more severe condition of WL (or lack the time to cure yourself) and I recommend you seek the advice of a second set of eyes. Chances are you are too close to your own condition and self medicating may not be the answer. Work with a collaborative writer or editor to help you with the consistency and tone of your messages. After only a couple of consultations and reviewing your existing content, a writer specializing in voice duplication can create impressions of you on paper.

Here’s to getting better soon!

How to Edit Your Own Writing. Getting Back to Basics.

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Christine

in Books-Speeches-Publishing, Concise writing, Love of writing and Your Voice Inc.

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These tips are for anyone interesting in creating quality content for books, blogs, ebooks, newsletters, ezines, and even daily email correspondence. Getting back to the basics is a great way to tackle a process that appears overwhelming or mystifying.

So What: You might have a pretty good idea why you are writing a book, ebook, newsletter, etc., but are you sure you know why someone should read it? What are your take-aways? What do you hope the reader would learn? How can it or will it make a difference in their lives?

Theme Party: You have already determined why someone should read your content therefore you are half way there. You have a theme. You have a driving force for continuity, but are you continuously making the connection, threading that theme throughout the product? It may seem obvious to you that each step, tool, story or strategy is related to the overall premise, but make sure you take the time to reinforce it with clarity. But let’s be clear: Continuity does not mean redundancy. Threading is not the same as repeating. There is the old adage of “Tell them what you are going to tell them. Tell them. Then tell them what you’ve told them.” Yes, this is true, just don’t hammer it into your reader or they will perceive this, and you, as not respecting their intelligence.

Too Much Good Stuff: I often have clients come to me when they have been told by a publisher that they need to cut their word count by 25-30%. Their expressions range from “But I don’t want to cut any of the stories or tools” or “I keep rereading it and I don’t see how I can cut anything.”

For most of us, being told that our work needs tightening is a bit ambiguous. It is easier for a publisher to say, and an author to hear, “you need to cut 2,000 words”. The end result, when done correctly, is the same. By looking for effective ways to cut word count, the writing becomes tighter and the manuscript reads better. You will find redundancy in your message and extraneous words that may be part of your day-to-day diction but have no real place or purpose in your manuscript. The thesaurus feature is a great tool for eliminating the redundancy of your most popular word choices. (See previous blog post, The Best Concise Writing Tip I Ever Learned for more details.)

My Two Tense Worth: Are you telling a story in the past or present tense? Pick one and go back through your writing to make sure it all matches. For instance, do you write, “we were expected to have our PowerPoint presentation available be at the event so I write the last few slides, I upload the graphics and I will send it off to my assistant to print and bind the hard copies.” Can you see how the beginning was in the past tense of “we were expected” and then suddenly all of the verbs that follow are in the present tense “write, upload, send.” It is very easy to slip back and forth when you verbally tell a story, but you have to be very careful when you put pen to paper.

Step away from the screen, there is nothing to see here, folks: Ever go back to an important email you sent or a blog you posted and find a mistake? You have no idea how you could have missed it. Simple, it is your work and your brain sees what it means, not necessarily what is on the screen. You may have forgotten the “it”, “do”, or used the wrong “their/there”, etc. and each time you initially reread it before you hit Send or Publish you could have sworn it was there. Save it and walk away for an hour or even a day. Fresh eyes are a key to making the obvious, well, more obvious.

Double Vision: You may think it is a masterpiece, it is exactly what you intended to say or wonder how there could ever be anything left to improve upon. Nice thought, but reach out to your network, your colleagues and a professional trained to make improvements. This second set of eyes is priceless but you need to remember to check your ego at the door. Nothing can zap your self-confidence more than the colored evidence of Track Changes splattered all over your precious work of art. Remember that you asked for suggestions and improvements and the result is your reader’s professional and sometimes personal opinion of what will make it better. Take what you want and leave the rest.

There is a lot to be gained by refining your writing abilities. Just as you are considered articulate based on your strong vocabulary, so will you hold expert status by others based on your clear, concise and well-written products.

Why Speakers Fear Writing Books

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Christine

in Books-Speeches-Publishing and Your Voice Inc.

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It would seem like a natural progression for a speaker to become an author but all too often the transition does not take place, or if it does it is years in the making.

Dear Speakers:
Let’s first review your talent as a successful speaker…

You obviously have quality content, or why else would you take the risk of standing up in front of 100’s or even 1,000’s of people and talking?
You have studied the interests and needs of your target market in order to fill a need, solve a problem and establish rapport.
You have done your research to present tangible and credible facts.
You have spent countless hours on PowerPoint or Keynote slides to visually represent your gems of wisdom.
You have crafted funny, inspiring and compelling stories to get your point across.

If you have agreed with the above statements, you already have a solid book inside of you so what is stopping you?

Fear #1: I am overwhelmed by the sheer mass of it all. I have all of these notes, copies of my speeches, blogs, newsletters, ezines, and audio files of my content but I don’t even know where to start. Whenever I think about trying to organize it I give up.

Most people feel the same way about their taxes. Our financial lives are all on paper in different files, in different drawers, closets and boxes and we don’t even want to start trying to organize them. But isn’t it great when your tax person gives you an assessment tool that reminds you of different areas for deductions you forgot about and you can simply fill in the blanks? Those receipts are the gems of your financial life.

All of your existing content, regardless of the medium, are your writing gems. A quality collaborator or editor will be able to provide you with tools and ideas to help “chunk” out these nuggets for you or even simply take your “receipts” and create a quality product for you. A new, second set of eyes is often the best method for getting things organized. You are not alone – what a relief!

Fear #2: I am articulate when I am speaking to my audience, but when I try to put thoughts down on paper, I freeze up.

You have a talent for the art of speaking and engaging a room full of people while making each audience member feel like you are talking directly to him/her. I admire your ability to make it look so effortless. Honor your own talent and don’t feel badly because it is not a seamless process for you to put it down on paper. Remember that not all writers make great speakers either! Take action and ask for help. Collaboration can be an incredibly energizing creative process.

Fear #3: If I am considered an expert or thought leader in my field, I feel like my manuscript has to be perfect and so I don’t even want to begin.

We tend to be procrastinators with certain projects out of a fear that it, or we, will not be good enough. How many times as a child did you say you didn’t feel like playing a game or a sport because you didn’t know how and did not want to fail? We are afraid to start something that could possibly verify our sense of inadequacy. Perfectionism can be a paralyzing force in many areas of our lives.

The great thing about writing is it does not have to be a solo event. Just like any other professional project, your results are much better when you surround yourself with talented people who can help. A good editor knows how to ask the right questions and weave your message. She should also know how to “rookie-proof” your content so that it speaks to your target market regardless of their education level or demographics. (This concept of rookie-proofing will be addressed in more detail in a later blog, so stay tuned.)

Fear #4: I just presented most of my content to my audience, why would they spend money on the book?

Why do you buy other speaker’s books? Why do we go see John Gray, Wayne Dyer or Suze Orman and still buy their books? Because we want more time to absorb the content. We want to work through the exercises in the book, or reread sections that were a-ha moments for us. We want to learn more on our own time, at our own pace, with the opportunity to find new nuggets each time. Your content has value and depth. Allow your audience the opportunity to go deeper.

Dear New Author:
Your book has arrived. It is on stage with you. It is in the hands of your audience members and you can see it on the tables in the back of the room. Congratulations! Next…

Julie & Julia Movie Inspires Us to Keep Writing

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Christine

in Books-Speeches-Publishing, Love of writing and Your Voice Inc.

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Meryl Streep’s brilliant performance not withstanding, I thoroughly enjoyed Julie & Julia for more reasons than originally predicted. In addition to my love of food and all things creative in the kitchen, I was inspired by the journey each woman took on her way to sharing her passion with the world. The strongest emotions came from the shortest lines spoken and the simplest scenes acted.

For every need, there is an audience.
Julia Child’s focus was to spend her time doing what she loved. Along the way she began her quest to bring to market something she was searching for without success; a book about French Cooking written for Americans.

What expertise or passion do you have?
How often do you find yourself talking about it simply because you want to share what you love and have learned?
What need exists that you can fill?

Imagine how much easier your marketing efforts will be if you follow your passion and produce a quality product that has universal appeal and is also unique in its delivery or approach.

It’s not all about me
Julia was inspired by her desire to help her readers, even down to the smallest of details. (Who knew there was a correct temperature for a mixing bowl when making mayonnaise?)

Let’s face it, adding Author to your title has a nice ring to it. However, keep your focus on always adding value. Share your expertise, your mistakes and your guidance. Even memoirs have lessons built in.

For those of you regularly engaged in social media, you know what it is like to have “followers” or “friends” who consistently post solely about themselves or their businesses. They seldom engage in adding value to others without it being tied to a subscription, special offer or free trial. After a while, you find yourself passing right by their entries or you un-follow or de-friend them altogether. Give, give, give…and ye shall receive.

Show me the money
It was quite a surprise to Julia Child when she first learned that authors were paying publishers to print their books. No matter what shifts continue to occur in the traditional and independent publishing word, writing for love and not money is the best approach for realizing your dream.

Remember that you don’t make money on a book; a book is there to make you money. Unless you are pulling down 6-figure advances, your book should be seen as your calling card; it is a catalyst for visibility and credibility. It helps to draw attention to your skills, separates you from your competition, and establishes you as an expert in your field. It will help you garner more clients, more speaking engagements and more opportunities to earn the interest of literary agents and publishers for future projects.

Rewards Realized
You don’t need to know how the story plays out in order to take the first step. It will all unfold in front of you, so long as you start down the path focused on giving rather than taking.

It will all be worth it the first time you see your words in print or your name on the program. The day I sat on the floor in the business section of my local Borders Bookstore is still such a vivid memory. When I opened the book and saw my own words, my stomach tightened, my mouth went dry and my eyes became wet. That moment was relived as I watched the final scene of Julie & Julia. I won’t spoil the ending for you….

How to Write for Your Audiences’ Learning Styles

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Christine

in Books-Speeches-Publishing and Your Voice Inc.

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Whether you are an author, speaker, trainer or leader you have probably realized that the most effective communication style is not about you, it’s about your audience. You may be a “tell it to me with bullet points” person but your reader or listener would rather be told a story.

We all use the three main learning styles in some form or another, but we do tend to have favorites when it comes to absorbing information and applying concepts to our lives.

Are you integrating all three of these styles into your book, speech, training sessions and mentoring programs? Develop well-rounded content by making sure you incorporate them into your work. Remember that it is not how you best learn that is important.

Learning styles and their most effective communication tools

Visual: Charts, diagrams, lists, spreadsheets, keynote slides, video files, DVDs, posters, writing exercises

Auditory: Dialogue, audio files, CDs, team or “buddy” exercises, reciting information

Kinesthetic & Tactile: “hands on” instruction, demonstrations, physical movement integration, building models, highlighting information

When you are describing a technique, presenting research findings, creating character development or delivering sales training can you show a graph or picture, insert dialogue and verbal repetition, run a video or audio program, and highlight key “take-aways”? Stretch yourself to include as many of these communication tools as possible so that your audience members or readers walk away feeling as though you added value and respected what works best for them. They will continue to come back for more.

Your Voice, Inc.