Writing for the Workplace: Business Communication for Professionals
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| Blogs and Microblogs Blogs and microblogs work hand in hand. Often a microblog announces the presence of a blog, which contains the meat of the message. Here we’ll discuss the purpose and content of composing in these media. Blogs Blogs—short for web logs—are actually websites with individual posts archived by date in reverse chronological order. Blog posts tend to be articles, reviews, white papers, or recommendations, but almost all have a bias or voice the author’s opinion. Because blogs are so plentiful, they must contain relevant information that appeals to readers and invites an interactive experience. Therefore part of each message usually includes a link to video clips, photographs, other blogs, websites, or an invitation to post comments. Blogs differ from a website in that they are dynamic and change frequently. Many blogs are the work of one author. However, it is not unusual fora blog to have multiple contributors, thus keeping the content voice fresh. News entities, corporations, government agencies, and individuals all produce blogs. The media is a major player in the blogosphere. Established media like The New York Times and Fortune magazine, for example, have blogs whose content is written by a staff writer or a contributor with expertise SOCIAL mEdIA ANd TExT mESSAGES on a topic. For example, a reporter who covers medicine for The New York Times may also contribute blog posts on medical-related topics. The articles differ from the blog posts, which are less formal, contain the writer’s opinion, and offer a link to a source. The news story published in the newspaper will be written in a more objective tone and may attribute a source but will not link directly to that source. Organizations use blogs to communicate directly with consumers by offering useful, consistent, and interesting updates. Interactive blogs can be highly effective channels of communication that produce a lot of bang fora relatively low cost. When consumers sign up to follow a blog, for example, they may share that information with their own network of friends. By doing so, the number of people exposed to the information can expand exponentially. It is this characteristic that makes blogs so popular with organizations. Individuals are responsible fora huge number of blogs. Some are read by a handful of friends and family others end up creating new careers for the authors. Julie Powell’s blogs about her cooking experiences of every recipe in Julia Child’s Mastering the Art of French Cooking lead to a book and a movie, Julie and Julia. Before that Powell was atypical something New Yorker. Blogs frequently use RSS technology (Rich Site Summary, also dubbed as Really Simple Syndication), which allows followers to keep track of a website. An RSS feed is a software application that aggregates syndicated content. When an author syndicates content, readers may sign up to follow those headlines, posts, or updates. Since a blog’s goal is often to accrue followers who sign up to follow it, blog writers incorporate search- able words and terms into the copy. Characteristics of Blog Writing for the Workplace Blogs written for business, government, or nonprofit organizations can take many shapes. Many if not most are written using the inverted pyramid organizational style. That is they begin with a paragraph that summarizes the main point. All details supporting that point are then arranged in descending order of importance and contain the 5Ws and H of journalism who, what, where, when, why, and how. Figure 5.1 illustrates the inverted pyramid organizational style. 60 WRITING FOR THE WORKPLACE Some blogs are written in a style that humanizes the dialogue between a company and its stakeholders. Consequently, the writing voice is more casual. In fact, some blogs read like a conversation with someone who has a distinctive voice. To capture that voice, using graphical elements such as underlining, italics, or dashes) or turns of phrase that helps the blog sound like a conversation is not just allowed—it’s expected. Look at the use of first person and casual language in this paragraph from Kevin Smiths post on Business Insider’s blog: Over the weekend at the SXSW Interactive conference in Austin, I had the opportunity to briefly try on Google’s next-generation gadget, Google Glass. The experience was interesting, to say the least …. The current design is dorky, but hopefully before they ship, Google can make Glass sleeker and not so noticeable. 2 Organizations use blogs to promote themselves or their brands. However, experts advise against the temptation to try to sell to readers or sound overly promotional. 3 Notices of sweepstakes, coupons, special offers, or contests should comprise no more than 10 percent of what the audience sees. Instead, the organization should focus on informative content, engaging conversation, links, and infographics. Blog post content falls into several broad types, as follows. Narrative Tells a story or provides an analogy to engage readers while explaining a concept or complex process. Key point summarized in tightly composed first paragraph Secondary information arranged in descending order of importance facts, explanations, examples Less critical information Download 3.09 Mb. Share with your friends:
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