Everybody Writes, 2nd Edition



1Everybody Writes

I was about to jump right into habits. To tell you that the key to taking your writing muscles from puny to powerful is to write every day. That writing is a habit, not an art.

But hold up.

Yes, all that is true. Yet, before we talk habits, let's reframe this idea of “writing.” What “writing” actually is. And when we do it.

As you think of developing your writing habit, realize that you already do write every day. You write emails. You post to Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram. You comment in Slack or post to internal company blogs.

Recognize all that posting for what it actually is: writing.

And reframe it as a legitimate aspect of your daily workout—in the same way that always taking the stairs becomes over time not just part of a fitness program but a philosophy for how you live your life.

This first chapter is a call to arms to improve all of your communications—not just the writing we think of as “content” or “copy.”

Embrace the idea that your words are your currency: They are a proxy, a stand-in for the important things you want to convey to your customers. Your colleagues. Your friends. And the world. That is especially true in a remote or distributed workplace, where work often gets done asynchronously—from various locations and with flexible work schedules.

Within those organizations, writing is the backbone of communication. Internal blogs stand in for meetings; messaging platforms stand in for real-time discussion. ...