Legal and Business Writing Consultant : Lori Herz : Write For Clients : Professional Writing and Online Content Consulting

When I started out as a lawyer 16 or so years ago, service professionals who wanted to use their business writing to gain visibility and grow their reputation had a choice of several print platforms, including:

• Trade journals

• Newspapers

• Newsletters

• Books

Among other common features, this traditional media group boasts:

• Static content

• One-way communication

• Space restrictions

• Limited distribution

• Gatekeepers

Fast forward to 2008. Traditional media is now keeping company with, and losing ground to, a host of new media (also called social media or Internet media) outlets such as:

• Blogs 
  

• Vlogs 
  

• Podcasts 
  

• Social Networks 
  

Real-time community, dialog and interactivity are key markers of this growing media space.

Service professionals looking to (1) build business relationships and (2) direct their marketing communications through new media channels will find solid guidance and practical tips via:

• Edith Yeung’s 50 Habits of a Highly Effective Blogger
  

• P.J. Fusco’s Five Getting-Started Blog Questions
  

• Kevin O’Keefe’s post on Why Every Client Should Want an Attorney Who Blogs
  

• Pam Slim’s inquiry into What the heck is a vlog? 
  

• Darren Rowse’s vlog post on how to Differentiate Your Blog

• Openculture's Podcast Primer

• Dennis Kennedy’s Podcasting for Lawyers

• Jessica E Vascellaro's WSJ article on Social Networking Goes Professional

• Business Week’s Social Networking 101
  

• Denise Howell’s and Ernest Svenson’s exchange on Social Networking for Lawyers
  

Although a few of these posts target a lawyer audience, service providers working outside the legal profession will also find them relevant and helpful.

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From time to time, service professionals emerge from the whirlwind that’s work and life to find that they’ve fallen out of touch with people in their business network. Especially at this time of year, when closing out the old and ringing in the new, there’s a pull to fix these broken connections.

Many professionals send out holiday cards and gifts as means to this end. While these offerings certainly can connect you with clients and business associates you’ve lost touch with, they’re largely one-way lines of communication.

The better route to re-connection runs two ways. It’s an organic dialogue that lends a human dimension to business relationships. Face-to-face and phone conversations enable this kind of interaction. But, you can also encourage and evolve it through your business writing.

There are a number of ways to channel your written words of re-connection, including:

• E-mails

• Websites

• Blogs

• E-Newsletters

Whatever channel you choose, it’s important to convey why you’re reaching out to your network and to invite recipients to reciprocate by sharing something about themselves and their work.

Curt Rosengren nicely illustrated this point when he e-mailed me an invitation to his Reconnection Revolution. Curt explained: “[I want to have] “30 conversations in 30 days with people I've never actually spoken with (as in voice) before. No particular agenda to the conversations – just seeing what I learn, how I’m inspired, and what new ideas pop up.”

I know Curt from the blogosphere. Still, ours was an arms-length association at best. We reduced that distance during our hour-long phone conversation. We discussed our personal and professional backgrounds, goals and challenges and offered each other advice and support.

Reflecting on his 30-day mission. Curt said: “People start talking, building relationships, exchanging ideas, even finding ways to collaborate. Next thing you know – hey presto! – the positive potential has just grown exponentially.”

Although Curt’s experiment took place in real-time, his model can be adapted to written communications. If his 30-in-30 formula seems a bit daunting, you can easily customize it so it works for you: think 5-in-5 or even 5-in-10 and see what happens in time.

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I’m planning to regularly round up writing and communications tips I’ve culled from my feeds and daily Web work.

To start off with a theme of sorts, I found a few recent tip sheets organized around the number 5.

First up are Five Tips for Writing Great Web Content brought to us by the Daily Writing Tips blog. They stress the importance of using a clear, jargon-free and conversational writing style.

Next, internet marketing strategist Lee Odden offers Five Tips for Content Distribution Networks. One of the best ways for service professionals to gain visibility on the Web and elsewhere is to produce written content that addresses the needs, interests or problems of the people you work with and want to work with.

But, as Odden points out, production is just one part of the equation. You also need to make the content readily available for consumption. Odden identifies several main distribution routes, including:

• Blogs

• E-Newsletters

• News Organizations

• Social Networking Sites

Next, Brian Clark of Copyblogger sets out Five Steps to a Truly Unique Blog. The two steps that stand out for me are:

• Identify the Difference

• Maintain Your Credibility

Taken together, they point up that your business writing (and your readers) will usually benefit from your unique perspective if it’s anchored in your authenticity instead of “false confidence or arrogance.”

Rounding out this roundup is a comprehensive listing of 150 Resources to Help You Write Better (yes, it’s a mid-span “5” tipped by Raymond Ward at the (new) legal writer blog ). Among other material, this roster comprises online:

• Almanacs

• Citation Guides

• Dictionaries

• News Media Resources

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Many service professionals dread the thought of networking. They would love to find a philosopher’s stone for converting their loose business contacts into a golden network of prospects, clients and referral sources. But, fantasy aside, successful networking requires action and persistence. Like any relationship-building endeavor, it also requires mutuality - a healthy combination of giving and receiving that’s organic and not contrived.

As it’s taken root in the service professions, blogging has become a channel for creating and fortifying natural webs of business connections. (If you need an introduction to business blogging, take a look at Kevin O’Keefe’s excellent collection of tips and thoughts on Blog Basics and the Art of Blogging) These networks typically build around useful and relevant information bloggers offer to address their readers’ business needs, challenges and concerns.

However, as Susan Cartier Liebel recently detailed, service providers can also cultivate business contacts by blogging about personal interests. Liebel’s post introduces us to lawyer Michael Keenan. After starting The Connecticut Elder Law Blog, Keenan launched Glastonbury Running to share insights and news with other local runners. Keenan’s blogs link to one another and to his conventional website. As Liebel reports: “Little did he realize [ ] his running blog would get more hits then his professional blog. Because they are linked he gets a tremendous amount of business from people who, first, find him and then relate to him as a runner.”

Keenan’s blogging experience highlights how we can make valuable business connections when we share our knowledge and ideas with people who can benefit from them. The connecting points forged through this kind of exchange are the sturdiest building blocks of present and future business associations.

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I've previously discussed how business writing can facilitate the human-to-human exchange that’s vital to successful client relationships.

An exchange is a two-way proposition.

Just as you need to learn about their issues, concerns and goals, your clients need to learn about you – the you that exists beyond your professional credentials and experience. This doesn’t mean that you spill all the details of your personal life. Rather, you offer appropriate anecdotes and insights that convey who you are as a person, thinker and collaborator.

Writing provides a solid platform for infusing your self into your business relationships. Susan Cartier Liebel nicely illustrates this point in a post about standing by the decision to start a solo law practice.

Through her writing, she depicts the emotions she felt while transitioning from solo law practice to her current work as a consultant, educator and blogger. She also acknowledges the feelings that lawyers often experience in going solo. I regularly read Liebel’s posts. But, given this new snapshot of the human behind the writer, I now have a heightened interest in her blog and other business offerings.

Many people resist, and even resent, the idea that self-expression is a business asset because it raises the specter of people pejoratively described as:

• Self-absorbed

• Selfish

• Self-Centered

• Self–Aggrandizing

While I understand why they make this connection, I think it’s a faulty one.

Certainly, self-expression can be taken to an unhealthy extreme. When that happens, there’s no room for give and take. So, there’s little to no chance of creating mutually rewarding and lasting relationships in business or elsewhere.

But, the same poor odds hold when we try to cultivate business connections without putting our selves into play.

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