I hope you find my writing and business tips and observations useful. My business and blog are dedicated to helping businesses communicate clearly and reach their potential.
Read, subscribe to my newsletter, enjoy!Tash
who owns the copyright?
Although I am not a lawyer and copyright is a complex area of law, I get a number of questions about copyright. Recently, I was asked about the ownership of content when a contractor writes something for a business and which entity would be listed in a copyright notice.
Generally, if you create something you own the copyright unless you assign it (in writing with a signature) to someone else. So if your agreement with a client doesn’t specify otherwise, you own the copyright in general terms.
You can assign a client the copyrights to use the material in certain ways – but perhaps limit them from owning other rights (e.g. international or movie rights) There does not have to be an exchange of money to exchange copyright – but it is something worth setting a price for commercially. Once you assign copyright to them, they own the copyright on the material under those stated conditions and thus only they would be on any copyright notice.
If you are an employee or a contractor under certain circumstances, the company owns copyright even if you are the creator. For contractors, this usually includes an agreement or expectation between you and the company, and may apply if they have initiated the work and paid you for all your time working on the project.
If a client owns the copyright, they don’t have to include your name in a copyright notice; if you own it, it is more likely that your notice would state ‘copyright owned by Justine and assigned to XYZ’ or equivalent.
Note that you will ALWAYS own the moral rights to the materials as these can not be bought or given away. This means that they can not represent the work in way that is negative towards you, deny it is written by you or adjust it and still call it yours.
When preparing a quote and agreement for companies, take copyright into consideration. Some of the things I write are useless to me anyway (e.g. a resume for someone else) so copyright isn’t worth fussing about, but if I write an article then copyright becomes a bigger issue and I charge more to give the other party full copyright over it.
Who owns copyright and how it is publicly presented depends upon the arrangement between you and a specific client. And not being a lawyer, I can’t give you a definitive answer but hopefully the above helps. Try www.copyright.org.au and get a copyright lawyer’s details from them if copyright becomes an issue for you.
Writing contracts
I’ve been asked recently about grammar and proper English for ‘important documents’ such as a contract.
Writing a contract has so much mystique and importance associated with it that many people find the thought of a contract to be intimidating. And to be honest, contracts written in legalese help that perception.
However, a contract is simply an agreement between two (or more) parties.
And a well written contract is simply communicating the details of an agreement.
A contract will outline the details of the arrangement so some contracts are much longer than others and some need much more attention to finer details such as provided by a lawyer. But the bottom line is that it is a business document and needs to communicate a clear message.
Writing contracts
Writing a contract is like any other business writing in that
- spelling is important
- grammar is important
- punctuation is important to ensure the correct meaning is understood
- good writing basics are important – for example, a contract needs no more capital letters than any other document
- clarity and simplicity make it easier to understand and read
- knowing the purpose beforehand makes it easier to write
- proof reading – and a second opinion – is critical
7 reasons to write efficiently
So Ron Denholm showed us the costs of writing inefficiently, hopefully inspiring people to write succinct documents with simpler words.
However, reading costs aren’t the only reason to write efficiently…
- a shorter document is visually more appealing so is more likely to have people start reading it
- It saves people reading time and therefore money – great if the people are in your pay and good service for your customers
- if it is easier and quicker to read, more people will actually read it so your message will reach a greater audience
- quicker and easier to read also increases the likelihood that your readers will absorb the information and/or be persuaded by your argument
- the proportion of relevant keywords will be higher in a reduced word count so it’s probably going to do better for your search engine results
- it is much easier to proof read fewer words and shorter words so it will also save you time, especially for documents that end up with multiple rounds of feedback and editing
- shorter documents require less paper which can save money and the planet! It also means that designers have more space to add images or adjust the layout to best suit the document
Writing efficiently saves money
Using the fewest words possible to communicate the message simply is my writing ideal, and I have been known to edit many documents to be well under 50% of their original length. One example that comes to mind is a 75 A4 page text-only disclosure document I converted into 24 A5 pages with pictures!
So I found it very interesting to read a report from Ron Denholm about the costs of inefficient writing.
In summary, Ron shows than reducing document size (through more concise content) by 34% in a business setting can save businesses $153 per document in reading time for a team of 100 (that adds up to $3,060 saved over 20 documents – scary amount!)
Next time you write a report, will you edit out the wasted words to be more efficient?
Understanding keywords in 9 steps
Once you set up your website and start reading about getting visitors (traffic) to your site, you are bound to hear about keywords (and key phrases but keywords is often used to mean both).
Here are a few points to help you understand keywords, their importance and how you can use them in your website content (and other online communications).
- keywords are simply words that summarise your message – don’t get caught up that they are magical or fancier than that. If you are a plumber, your keywords could be plumber, pipes, gas fitting and domestic, but would exclude business, builder and accounts.
- when you enter words into a search engine to find something, you are effectively using keywords. The web pages ranking highest for those keywords are what you will see in the search engine results
- behind each web page is some information known as meta data. This is part of how websites and search engines work, so is another aspect of using keywords as you can add a string of keywords in your meta data.
- make sure you use keywords that your potential customers will use
- don’t use too many keywords as it gets hard to read and search engines may assess it as an attempt to trick them. Always write for humans so it is interesting and relevant, rather than writing nonsense just to get keywords on a page
- each page on your site has a different purpose and will have different content so don’t expect each one to have exactly the same combination of keywords. In fact, search engines apparently give better ranks to sites with varied keywords across the site.
- specific words (e.g. dresses compared to clothes) are easier to rank well for but they are likely to have fewer searches so you need to balance which keywords are most useful to you. Of course, less effective words can still be used but just less often than your main keywords.
- use keywords in your online ads and directory listings, social media profiles, etc – not just in your own web pages. When you have the control, get keywords in the text of links to your site, too.
- within the boundaries of writing for humans, remember that keywords earlier in a piece of writing and highlighted in some way will have more impact than keywords late in the piece. (By highlighted I mean placed in a title or heading, in bold font or in italics)
If you used a good web designer in creating your site, they have probably added some keywords into your meta data, headers, image descriptions and so on. Likewise, if your content was professionally written, edited or reviewed, there are likely to be some well placed keywords on your site already.
However, it is an ongoing task to keep your keywords working effectively so worth understanding even if someone else manages it for you.
This post is part of Word Constructions’ Setting up a website series
1. having a website helps more than you
2. what’s involved in setting up a website?
3. Learn about web hosting
4. Preparing your initial website content
5. Managing website design 101
6. Choosing a web designer
7. Basic web pages
8. Navigating your site
9. Making web content attractive
Formatting email text
Did you know that our eyes focus on the left margin so this is the best place to start writing?
This applies to letters and other written materials (only very old fashioned styles would have indented paragraphs for letters) but even more so to electronic materials such as emails.
Of course, the other advantage of starting paragraphs on the left margin is that it is easier to type – no formatting pages or repeatedly using the tab button! And for email systems that indent previous email messages when forwarding (a very annoying system in my opinion but that’s off the point!), having indented paragraphs would look absolutely horrible and potentially end up far to the right.
So the simple answer to how to format emails is – don’t! That is, don’t format the main text – you do need to consider a space after the greeting and between paragraphs.
Let your words be the focus of your emails, and use your words wisely!
Preparing your initial website content
Filling an entire website with content can be a bit daunting, especially when you are also trying to get the design and navigation settled. So the third part of our series on getting your business online is about some initial website content.
Rule number one – don’t put up a message like “under construction”.
Search engines don’t like it – and nor do humans for that matter! To me, it looks lazy as it is not much harder to put a brief message on a temporary homepage than to write those two boring words there.
Obeying rule number one, many people therefore don’t have anything showing on their site during the development phase. This seems like a waste to me – the sooner your site is up, the sooner you can send people there (i.e. you don’t have to delay all marketing while waiting) and let search engines discover it.
So my suggestion is to have an interim homepage that can go live very quickly, giving you and your designer a bit of breathing space.
Here’s what to include on that interim page…
- your business name! obvious but very important!
- your logo if you have one – don’t use a makeshift logo though
- some basic contact details. Top or bottom of the page or in text doesn’t matter as long as someone can find out how to get in touch with you. A message like “Our full website will be here soon but in the meantime please email us on **@do****.com or call 1234 3456″ covers it nicely
- your tagline, if you have one
- your USP (and you need one if you haven’t already got one)
- some basic information about your business and/or website so people can determine if you offer what they were after in the first place. Sure many won’t come back but some will if they think you will meet their need. A paragraph or two or a bullet list is all you need
- if you have them and are using them for your business, add links (preferably via graphics than text) to social media profiles so you connect all your online presences
So with a domain name, a host and some initial content, you can have a simple web presence quite quickly. Does it feel a it easier to achieve now?
Although an interim page like this is not an ideal website, it is better than nothing so just taking this step will get you online.
If you still doubt the value or worth of getting online, get an interim site up (grab some monthly hosting and you can do it for under $50, too) and monitor your calls and sales for a couple of months. Let me know if the website makes a significant difference to your leads – or even if it gives you one more!
This post is part of Word Constructions’ Setting up a website series
1. having a website helps more than you
2. what’s involved in setting up a website?
3. Learn about web hosting
When a date doesn’t date…
In the last week we have seen a lot about world and local financial markets – they dropped drastically but has already picked up some of that again. Have you tried researching information about this situation, either in general or for something specific?
News without a date
Knowing the date can be important for context
I was looking at various superannuation sites yesterday to see what they were telling members about their investments and was amazed that not all listed a date for the news item they had published.
One in particular started their article with “Last week was a tumultuous one for world share markets” and finished with a footnote “*SR50 Balanced fund SuperRatings Crediting Rate Survey, June 2011”.
So was it about things that happened last week (i.e. early August 2011) or some other week since June 2011?
I’m fairly confident the article went live in the last 48 hours so presumably it is about recent developments. But what if I hadn’t looked at their site until next week – would the data still be relevant or useful?
Yes, putting dates on websites can date them fast (the ‘last updated’ reference on many pages is the prime example of that) but current news items are the exception.
I have often read blog posts and wondered when it was written; “new version of ABC will be released next month” and “our web visitors doubled in the past 12 months” carry more weight when I understand ‘next month’ and ‘past 12 months’. A small note after the post is fine (WordPress does it by default and that works for me!)
People need to have a context, a reference point for the information. Especially for things like financial markets which change so rapidly at times.
And just to be clear, this is being written on 10 August 2011!
What, if any, pages on your site do you add a date to? If not all pages are the same, why do you add dates to some but not others?
Improving your writing
Whether you write a lot and just like learning more or you feel your writing needs a lot of work, you can do many things to improve it. I was reminded of this recently by reading a blog post about the impact of Twitter on a writer.
Here are some quick ideas you may be able to use:
- if your writing is too long winded, use Mallory’s trick of thinking of each sentence as a tweet – with 140 characters it is hard to waffle on!
- read as broadly as possible – you are learning about writing every time you read something so reading different styles will teach you more
- think about what you read – not all the time, but occasionally put some conscious thought into the words used to send a message
- practice – there is nothing better at making you a better writer than to write, so write!
- study writing – maybe learn to spell a new word each week, read some tips on good writing, follow some blogs about writing (well done – reading this means you’ve already started!) or grab a grammar text book
- offer to edit and read over someone else’s work, too – teaching is always a great way to cement things in your own brain, and you may be amazed at what you can learn from others’ mistakes. What’s more, being able to see how others can improve their writing will probably build your confidence
- find someone to give you some honest feedback (on specific pieces or overall) and maybe some tips on areas you need to improve – I’ve done this with a few people and it does help them hone their skills
Writing’s main importance is in being able to communicate, to express yourself (or your business) to others effectively. You don’t have to be the world’s best writer but you can choose to improve and not be the world’s worst writer!
Unintended meanings
I was recently reminded that it is important to take care not to communicate anything different to your words and intentions. That is, your words may tell one story but the context will also communicate a message and you want them to match.
A sign in our motel during last week’s trip to Canberra read
Due to “health regulations” no pets allowed in rooms
The quotation marks are completely unnecessary and mean either the person writing the sign didn’t know that (not a great message to send out, but common enough) or they were making a point about the regulations. That is, the writer thinks the regulations are silly, inappropriate, ineffective, irrelevant or such and therefore calls them “regulations’ to point out they are not well accepted.
Maybe disagreeing with the regulations shows some support of pets and pet lovers, but to me it is not very professional or reassuring. If you have no respect for the regulations, how can I be sure you are sticking to them in ways I would want you to? If a health inspector visits, how will they respond to implications of inferior regulations?
When you consider every word you write, remember to also consider the surrounding details such as punctuation, images and placement so that you are not giving any unintended messages.
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