International Literacy Day was Sept. 8. To help raise awareness of the importance of literacy, our friends at Grammarly (the source for some of the best shares on Facebook) produced the following infographic with literacy statistics from around the world. In the U.S., 32 million adults (14 percent of the population) can't read — and 19 [...]
You’ve got a great idea for a book but don’t have the time or the skills to write it yourself You know you should be blogging but you’re too busy to do it regularly and effectively You’d like to produce information products but aren’t able to get them organized and written You know content marketing [...]
Proofreading often proves difficult. Why? Because for the most part, when attempting to proofread your own writing, you read what you thought you wrote. And even after letting your work “cool off,” it’s difficult to catch every error in a single reading. Unless you’re a juggler accustomed to having six or eight items in the [...]
Fifty Shades of Grammar Full disclosure: I have not read Fifty Shades of Grey and I won't be seeing the movie. But I have heard plenty of criticism of the quality of the writing. Turns out that the criticism may not be warranted, especially when this novel is compared to other bestselling works of fiction. [...]
Should you let your customers know about your personal and political opinions? For many years, I advised my clients to keep their personal and political views private and to choose non-controversial charities for their companies to support. My recommendation was based on the idea that some people who disagree with you may decide not [...]
Allen West (and other public figures): Do you know what your social media team is posting? I'm a conservative and I follow a lot of well-known conservatives (and a few liberals, too) on social media. I know that most of their posts are actually made by staffers, not by the public figures themselves. I also understand [...]
Recently I spoke to the National Association of Entrepreneurs about blogging. While there are a lot of ingredients that must be combined to create an effective, successful blog, the most important is quality content. What makes quality content? It is: Well-written. Use correct grammar, spelling, punctuation, syntax and sentence structure. Avoid jargon and abbreviations your [...]
Some blogs with information worth sharing: On Twitter: Do you find it a challenge to get your point across in 140 characters or less? (Ideally less, so you can allow for re-Tweeting.) Seth Lieberman offers 5 great Twitter writing tips, including: keep your message to just the facts; be timely; include friends and associates; and [...]
How you can use the same techniques trial lawyers do when dealing with your employees When an attorney is in front of a jury, there’s a lot at stake, which is why successful trial lawyers know how to purposely and effectively sway jurors. You can put the techniques they use to work in your [...]
The next time you’re in a situation where you’re not getting the performance out of a person that you need, try thanking them for doing what you want them to do – even if they haven’t done it yet. Most people will respond by trying to earn the appreciation you expressed. For example: You have [...]
