ou’re a businessperson. You may not think of yourself as a writer, but you know that writing well can boost your results and your career. Naturally, you want to do better. Every week I point you to articles and blog posts that I think will teach you something or spark an idea or two. Some weeks there are more pointers than others.
Articles & Posts
This week I’m pointing you to pieces on using the “rule of three” to improve your writing and strategies for generating more content.
From Brian Clark: How to Use the ‘Rule of Three’ to Create Engaging Content
“It all comes down to the way we humans process information. We have become proficient at pattern recognition by necessity, and three is the smallest number of elements required to create a pattern. This combination of pattern and brevity results in memorable content, and that’s why the Rule of Three will make you a more engaging writer.”
From James Chartrand: Easy strategies for an endless stream of content
“Feeding the content beast is often one of the tasks on the Top 10 Most Hated Chores of writers, and its needs are almost nuts – if you want to succeed, you need to create content for your blog, your newsletter, your email-marketing strategy, your social media accounts, your guest post blog targets, your emails, your handouts.”
Reading Lists and Suggestions
Stephen King says that if you want to be a writer, there are two things you must do: read a lot and write a lot. This section of the Writing Edge is about the “read a lot” part.
From Lee Crutchley: Five Essential Books for Figuring It Out
“Lee Crutchley is is an illustrator, blogger, and author. His work has been described as ‘Kind of like Banksy with a sketchbook and some Sharpies.’ His latest book How to be Happy (or at Least Less Sad) is a series of supportive, surprising, and engaging prompts, that help the reader to see things in a new light, and rediscover simple pleasures and everyday joy. In short, Lee knows a thing or two (or million!) about helping people figure it out. Here are his five essential books on that very subject”
From James Kaplan: Ten books to make you a better business technologist
“What books does McKinsey’s James Kaplan put on his must-read list for business technologists? You may be surprised.”
Sources I Check Regularly
I find the posts and articles that I share with you on The Writing Edge in many places. But there are a few that provide insightful pieces again and again. Here they are.