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When writing a business pitch or other company related documents, many people let themselves down because of grammatical and stylistic mistakes. But follow the eight useful tips below and your next pitch will be more effective, more powerful and error-free.
1. Avoid tired hyperbole – Too many companies "think outside the box," use "state of the art solutions", "have a team-oriented approach" and "partner with their clients." Prospective clients can glaze over when they hear these shop-worn business boasts hyperbolically used "ad infinitum" or dare we say "ad disgustum?"
2. Remember the motto: "It IS all about YOU" – We become consultants because we want to sell OUR personal services and expertise TO someone who needs US and is willing to pay US for our special expertise. Next time, remember this - people hire professionals! This is why you should make sure your next proposal addresses the client directly: "We will do this for you, the way you want it done, and we will do it better and faster than the competition...."
3. Watch out for misused modifiers – If your original sentence was, "We will conduct a detailed analysis..." and you change "detailed" to "exhaustive", make sure you change "a" to "an". This mistake is easy to miss and cuts credibility.
4. Organize your points with bulls-eye bullets – Use bullets liberally. Bullets open up the space on the page making it easier for people to read. In business presentations most people drop punctuation entirely and often capitalize each bulleted item. If you compile a proposal from various sources within your firm, just make sure the punctuation or lack thereof is consistent.
5. Check your lists for consistency – Make sure each item on a list logically fits in with the list's common denominator. For example, in "We will analyse your company's database for validity, security system access, hardware costs, and replace wiring," the last list item doesn't fit. Likewise, unless there is a reason for numbering the items – such as activities to be performed in sequence - omit any numbers, letters and Roman numerals.
6. Use computer and maths words appropriately – Use computer terms such as "input" when talking about computer databases, "bandwidth" when discussing telecommunications capacity and "parameter" when discussing mathematical limits. Avoid sentences such as "Our firm has the bandwidth necessary to input our recommendations within the parameters of the contract." How about, "We've got the people and skills to do the job."
7. Take the piano tuner test – After you have written your proposal, change the service you provide – accounting, advertising, marketing consulting, public relations – to piano tuning. If the proposal still makes sense, chances are it is so vague that it says nothing about your specific services, your company's unique qualities and the specific benefits of hiring you.
8. Enrich your text – Writing is hard. Grammar is not enough. Do these two super-short sentences really explain themselves? As any good writer knows, content can be improved by a more varied effective writing style that makes use of alternating sentence lengths and a rich descriptive vocabulary.
Hilla Ovil-Brenner is CEO of grammar and spelling software firm WhiteSmoke.
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BusinessZONE: Improving Your Pitch
This article by WhiteSmoke CEO Hilla Ovil-Brenner appeared on the BusinessZONE Marketing/PR Blog on the 12th December 2007.When writing a business pitch or other company related documents, many people let themselves down because of grammatical and stylistic mistakes. But follow the eight useful tips below and your next pitch will be more effective, more powerful and error-free.
1. Avoid tired hyperbole – Too many companies "think outside the box," use "state of the art solutions", "have a team-oriented approach" and "partner with their clients." Prospective clients can glaze over when they hear these shop-worn business boasts hyperbolically used "ad infinitum" or dare we say "ad disgustum?"
2. Remember the motto: "It IS all about YOU" – We become consultants because we want to sell OUR personal services and expertise TO someone who needs US and is willing to pay US for our special expertise. Next time, remember this - people hire professionals! This is why you should make sure your next proposal addresses the client directly: "We will do this for you, the way you want it done, and we will do it better and faster than the competition...."
3. Watch out for misused modifiers – If your original sentence was, "We will conduct a detailed analysis..." and you change "detailed" to "exhaustive", make sure you change "a" to "an". This mistake is easy to miss and cuts credibility.
4. Organize your points with bulls-eye bullets – Use bullets liberally. Bullets open up the space on the page making it easier for people to read. In business presentations most people drop punctuation entirely and often capitalize each bulleted item. If you compile a proposal from various sources within your firm, just make sure the punctuation or lack thereof is consistent.
5. Check your lists for consistency – Make sure each item on a list logically fits in with the list's common denominator. For example, in "We will analyse your company's database for validity, security system access, hardware costs, and replace wiring," the last list item doesn't fit. Likewise, unless there is a reason for numbering the items – such as activities to be performed in sequence - omit any numbers, letters and Roman numerals.
6. Use computer and maths words appropriately – Use computer terms such as "input" when talking about computer databases, "bandwidth" when discussing telecommunications capacity and "parameter" when discussing mathematical limits. Avoid sentences such as "Our firm has the bandwidth necessary to input our recommendations within the parameters of the contract." How about, "We've got the people and skills to do the job."
7. Take the piano tuner test – After you have written your proposal, change the service you provide – accounting, advertising, marketing consulting, public relations – to piano tuning. If the proposal still makes sense, chances are it is so vague that it says nothing about your specific services, your company's unique qualities and the specific benefits of hiring you.
8. Enrich your text – Writing is hard. Grammar is not enough. Do these two super-short sentences really explain themselves? As any good writer knows, content can be improved by a more varied effective writing style that makes use of alternating sentence lengths and a rich descriptive vocabulary.
Hilla Ovil-Brenner is CEO of grammar and spelling software firm WhiteSmoke.
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