Author: Michelle Troutman

Michelle Troutman has spent more than a decade crafting attention-getting newsletters and other content for service providers. She specializes in creating standout e-newsletters for law firms and economic development organizations. Her marketing and business administration background and education enhance clear and persuasive copy that speaks to the right clients. Through features in publications like "Attorney at Work" and "Law Fuel," and her e-newsletter and YouTube channel, she inspires service professionals to create engaging content. She enjoys helping businesses that sell their expertise reach their ideal customers.
writing advice

5 Grammar Rules You Can (Sometimes) Break

The passive voice – Passive verbs, those in “to be” form tend to weaken sentences compared to active verbs. You can’t always avoid them, especially if you don’t know who did (or will do) something.

Example: “Your landscape plan determines how you want your lawn and garden to be designed.”

In this case, if the document isn’t specifically addressed to the do-it-yourselfer, the passive voice is a shortcut around whether the reader will handle the details him or herself or choose a professional.

Otherwise, knowledge of who will tackle the task yields a more direct revision: “Your landscape plan determines how you want to design your lawn and garden.”

Prepositions at the end of sentences – “With,” “for,” “on,” and “to” are among the prepositions some grammarians suggest you shouldn’t park at the end of sentences. But if you rearrange them, your sentences will sometimes sound awkward.

Example: “Which street are you on?” vs. “On which street are you?”

Conjunctions at the beginning of sentences – When I was in elementary school, my teachers advised me not to start my sentences with because, but, also, and, or other conjunctions; despite the formality, it was a way to make students work harder to word their sentences. To me, it’s fine if the sentences you start with those conjunctions aren’t merely fragments.

Example: “And vanilla ice cream.”
Better edit: “And I love vanilla ice cream.”

Split infinitives – The phrase Captain Kirk (William Shatner) says during the Star Trek TV series opening credits before the theme starts is a classic example: “To boldly go where no one has gone before.” (a la Grammar Girl.) Essentially, it’s the placement of an adverb — in this case, boldly, before a verb form (to go; the infinitive) — instead of after it, where some grammarians believe adverbs traditionally belong. Sometimes, it just doesn’t sound right to position adverbs properly, and we split infinitives to clarify what we mean.

Use of the second person – Depending on their audience, not everyone writes in a formal, grammatically correct tone. It’s more personal and direct to refer to you as you, instead of the more distant phrase the reader.

Quotes

English usage is sometimes more than mere taste, judgment, and education — sometimes it’s sheer luck, like getting across the street. ~ E.B. White

Arguments over grammar and style are often as fierce as those over IBM versus Mac, and as fruitless as Coke versus Pepsi and boxers versus briefs. ~ Jack Lynch

Comments? Suggestions? Need help with your writing? Feel free to contact me.

Michelle Troutman
classywriting.com

business communication, business writing, writing advice, writing well, writing with clarity

5 Ways to “Write Tight” for Your Business

1. Omit needless words. This is the best advice to “write tight.” As William Strunk and E.B. White wrote in their classic grammar book, The Elements of Style, every word should “tell” or serve a purpose. When you’re done writing, see if removing certain words changes the overall meaning of your sentences. Make your sentences leaner and “meaner,” to strengthen them and pack more of a punch.

2. Plan. To keep your thoughts focused, create a list or an outline detailing your subject matter. Some people dislike planning, but this simple step helps me stay organized and on topic.

3. Set a word limit. Limit the scope of your piece to a certain number of words to help you cut the deadwood.

4. Prefer one word over two. For example, the two sentences below have a similar meaning, but one is more to the point:

A. Turn on the light.
B. Flip the switch.

5. Use bullet points. Bullet points help summarize key ideas. They work well for grouping words and phrases together, so you don’t always need to write complete sentences. For example:

Backing Crash Prevention

  • Eliminate distractions
  • Keep your eyes moving
  • Use your mirrors

Quotes

“Four basic premises of writing: clarity, brevity, simplicity, and humanity.” ~ William Zinsser

“Brevity is the soul of wit.” ~ William Shakespeare, Hamlet

Uncategorized

5 Ways Writing by Hand Can Improve your Writing

1. Think time — When we take pen to page or finger or stylus to screen, the slower movements of our hand and fingers give us a few more seconds to gather our thoughts.

2. Short cuts — The time we spend writing by hand can make us less likely to ramble on; we’ll feel less wordy, especially if writer’s cramp sets in during the process.

3. Better focus — Armed with just a pen and a blank page, fewer visuals can distract you from writing.

4. Mindfulness — The act of hand writing can use more of our brain — including the right and left hemispheres — than typing and result in a more thoughtful piece. As quoted in Reader’s Digest, “‘Writing by hand is different from typing because it requires using strokes to create a letter, rather than just selecting the whole letter by touching a key,’ says Virginia Berninger, a professor of psychology at the University of Washington. These finger movements activate large regions of the brain involved in thinking, memory, and language.”

5. Freedom — Lack of distractions, more time with the page, greater care in our wording, and use of our minds can unleash our creative spirits to take our writing to a deeper level, especially if we don’t write by hand often. A change of routine, such as a sunny day rest on a park bench writing with pen and notepad might be a great way to refresh your prose and stimulate a new perspective.

Quotes

“I write with a felt-tip pen, or sometimes a pencil, on yellow or white legal pads, that fetish of American writers. I like the slowness of writing by hand.” ~ Susan Sontag

“People complain that writing by hand is slow, but that can be good for thinking and creating. It slows us down to think and to contemplate and to revise and recast. Its physical presence can be a goad to completing tasks, whereas computer files can easily be hidden and thus forgotten.” ~ David Allen, Getting Things Done

Comments? Suggestions? Need help with your writing? Feel free to contact me.

Michelle Troutman
classywriting.com

Uncategorized

6 Books to Improve Your Writing

1. The Elements of Style by William Strunk, Jr. and E.B. White
This is one of the first and shortest books to improve your writing I’ve ever read; much of the advice is memorable, and I apply it to this day. It was first published over 100 years ago, but good style is always in fashion. Some grammar snobs hate it because they consider the advice too rigid and archaic, but for everyone else, the book offers the best of the basics.

2. The Elements of Grammar by Margaret Sherzer
This is somewhat of a companion to Strunk and White’s book, published by the same publisher, Macmillan. It’s a short guide to punctuation, spelling, and usage, which you can browse by topic for an “on the spot remedy” to heal common writing ailments.

3. The Chicago Manual of Style by University of Chicago Press Staff (Editor) and 4. The Associated Press Stylebook and Briefing on Media Law by The Associated Press
Following a certain style is good for consistency in your English usage, and for consultation when you’re not sure how to write certain words or to properly credit facts or sources.

These books to improve your writing can be your bibles to write “right.” Some key differences between both style guides lie in the formatting of certain words and punctuation. For example, AP style is well-known for omitting the serial, or Oxford, comma.

5. Writing Down the Bones: Freeing the Writer Within by Natalie Goldberg
Goldberg applied her experiences with Zen meditation to writing, making it simpler by removing the rules. With short chapters, you don’t have to read her book cover-to-cover for insights. Some of the advice can seem a little bohemian, especially with her references to writing in cafés, and her emphasis on poetry. I’ve found the writing exercises helpful for writing better descriptions. They can apply to any type of writing. Or, to go further beyond, to quote Ms. Goldberg, “What is said here about writing can be applied to running, painting, anything you love and have chosen to work with in your life.”

6. On Writing Well by William Zinsser
“This is a book for people who want to learn how to write. It’s also a book for people in every kind of job who have to do some writing just to get through the day; most people do more writing than they realize.” ~ William Zinsser

Separated into two parts, Zinsser’s book covers “Principles” and “Forms and Methods.” He preaches four articles of faith: clarity, simplicity, brevity, and humanity. His “informal guide to writing non-fiction” covers these and other basics, on such topics as usage, revisions, and oh, yes, even business writing; he uses anecdotes and personal experiences to illustrate his points.

Quotes

“Four basic premises of writing: clarity, brevity, simplicity, and humanity.” ~ William Zinsser

“Play around. Dive into absurdity and write. Take chances. You will succeed if you are fearless of failure.”  ~ Natalie Goldberg, Writing Down the Bones: Freeing the Writer Within

Comments? Suggestions? Need help with your writing? Feel free to email me: michelle “at” classywriting.com

Michelle Troutman
Classy Writing
207.332.8379

writing advice

5 More Commonly Confused Words

1. except/accept – These words can be easy to confuse because they look similar and sound the same. Except means not including, whereas accept means to consent to receive something offered or believe or come to recognize (an opinion, explanation, etc.) as valid or correct. One way to remember the differences between them is to think of their prefixes, ex- and ac-. Ex- means not part of, and you can think of the letter X, which to many of us, is a symbol or short-hand for exclusion. Accept begins with a, as does its synonym, agree, so you can think of it as if it’s A-OK.

2. ensure/insure – Their meanings are similar, in the sense that they make a result more sure. To ensure means to make sure. To insure means to secure or protect something or to buy an insurance policy for protection from loss. In general, the word tends to have a more financial focus than ensure.

3. compliment/complement – These words are even more confusing because their pronunciation is the same. Obviously, the key difference between them lies in one letter: “i” and “e.” Both words also generally have positive meanings.

A compliment is a polite expression of praise or admiration or an act or circumstance that implies praise or respect. You compliment someone when you tell him or her you like his or her new haircut.

Complement is a thing that completes or brings to perfection, a number or quantity of something required to make a group complete, or to add to (something) in a way that enhances or improves it; make perfect. A way to remember the differences between them is to think of the word complete when you think of the word complement — they both have an e. Like the word polite, compliment has an i.

4. piece/peace – These are yet more words that sound alike, have similar spellings, but have different meanings. Common phrases such as “peace of mind” and “to give someone a piece of your mind” add to the confusion. A piece is a part of something whole, to piece means to assemble something from parts and peace is defined as freedom from disturbance; tranquility or the end of war or violence. When I think of piece, I think of pie — it helps that the first three letters are the same, and I make the connection to a slice of a pie. Peace is more of a full, whole concept.

5. then/than – Then means at that time or afterward. Than is often used in comparison to something else or when contrasting something.

Examples:

John will put on his pajamas, and then go to bed.
Mary’s hair is longer than her sister Rachel’s.

Think of how you pronounce then and than and think before you use them in sentences when you write; practice pronouncing the a in than and the e in then more clearly to also help you remember their differences.

Quotes

“Our language is funny — a ‘fat chance’ and a ‘slim chance’ are the same thing.” ~ J. Gustav White

“If the English language made any sense, lackadaisical would have something to do with a shortage of flowers.” ~ Doug Larson

Comments? Suggestions? Need help with your writing? Feel free to contact me.

Michelle Troutman
classywriting.com