Use your active voice!

When it comes to writing, voice refers to the form of the verb as it relates to its subject. As we have discussed previously, verb choice is important. The stronger the verb, the stronger the sentence. The strongest verbs are those written in the active voice. The active voice occurs when the subject of the sentence performs the action.

Example of active voice:
Julia dazzled onlookers at the dance contest.
Who did the dazzling? That's right - Linda did. See, we're not afraid to say it. Strong sentence.

Same sentence in passive voice:
Onlookers were dazzled by Julia at the dance contest.
Now the subject (onlookers) receives the action (being dazzled), making this sentence passive voice. See the difference?

When you use the passive voice, you rob your sentence of power. Passive voice sentence construction weakens strong verbs and causes awkward sentences. For marketers, active voice is especially important because active voice denotes action, and when you are writing for the consumer, you want the reader to take action. What better way to inspire action than by using active verbs in active voice?

Let's look at some more examples:

Passive voice:
The standard for writing was set by Shakespeare.
Yawn. Weak action.

Same sentence in active voice:
Shakespeare set the standard by which writers today are measured.
See how much better this is. Active. Who did it? Shakespeare did. What did he do? He changed the standards for all writers. Active.

In our next example, we'll see why passive voice can be so confusing to the reader.
When the Watergate hotel was bugged, democracy was undermined immeasurably.
Who did the bugging? This sentence doesn't specify, but we all know who was behind it -- that sneaky little Dick Nixon. Who undermined democracy? Again, this weak sentence dodges that issue by using passive voice. But we all know the answer to that, don't we. I thought so.

Words that have no bite

There are some words in the English language that get used frequently, signifying nothing. These words should be avoided as they tend to undermine credibility due to their lack of specificity.

Very
This word was perhaps best used by Valley Girls in the 80s. That seems appropriate as it the epitome of uselessness.
What does it tell you? Nothing whatsoever. Let's take a look, shall we?

Example 1:
He was very mad.
What, isn't being mad enough? Very tells me nothing. However, if you were to say:
He was so mad his face turned the same color as Santa's jammies.
OK. Now I get the picture.
Example 2:
She looked very pregnant.
You're either pregnant or you're not. What constitutes "very" pregnant? Twins? Triplets? Again, very doesn't tell me anything.

Many
Another word that has tells us nothing. Journalists are told not to use this word as it can be misleading.

Example 1:
Many people believe Lee Harvey Oswald was just a patsy.
What are we talking about here - 60 percent? Two out of 10 people? There's no way for me to tell how many we're talking about here. It would be so much better to be able to say:
More than 80 percent of Americans surveyed by U.S. News & World Report said they think that Oswald was a patsy.

Same thing goes for the words "some" and "a lot." They don't really tell us much, do they? If you want your words to have meaning, your writing must be as specific as possible. Avoiding this vague words that tell you little, your writing will be stronger and your readers will have more confidence in what you're communicating to them.

To quote or not to quote

The quotation mark is often misunderstood. Perhaps that is because it's shy and likes to stay at home on Friday nights rather than associate with party punctuation like apostrophes and the biggest party animal of them all, the exclamation point.

In general, full quotation marks should be used only to denote directly attributed speech (someone's exact words) and special-use words that would be confusing without this emphasis. Do NOT use quotation marks for regular emphasis.

Incorrect:
We offer a "happy pen" to every new customer.
No emphasis is needed here. We won't have to explain or define a 30-day cookie.

Correct:
We offer our new "maties" a free pen.
Maties in this case is a new term we just coined to refer to something we just made up (refers to our special clients who happen to be pirates.) We can't assume people know what it means.

When quoting someone, you must report every word they say accurately.
Example:
"It's hotter than Hades here today," said John.

If you didn't quite catch every word, you will have to paraphrase rather than risk misquoting someone.
Example:
John said it's hot in Kansas City today.

You also use quotation marks for all composition titles such as books, computer games, movies, operas, plays, poems, songs, television programs and the titles of lectures, speeches and works of art.
One exception is newspaper titles, which are always placed in italics.
Example: The Wall Street Journal wrote a scathing review of "The Da Vinci Code."

Using the new words of the digital age

Here are some things to keep in mind when using common words related to the internet.

The Easy E's
e-commerce - The dash is necessary to denote that 'e' is an abbreviation for electronic. Only exception will be company names that omit the dash.
e-mail - The dash is necessary to denote that 'e' is an abbreviation for electronic.

What's in a name?
Information Superhighway - Please avoid this term in all documents written after 1995.
Internet - Internet is always capitalized.
web - only capitalized if it starts a sentence or is part of a company name.
web site - It's two words and the 'w' is only capitalized if it starts a sentence.