Blog & Resources
Our blog: 3000messages
Get writing tips directly from Lingo Training at http://3000messagesblog.com. Our blog is full of interesting tips and insights that will help you improve your business and personal communications. From tips on general writing and presentations to grammar, spelling, design, and more – 3000messages is an invaluable learning tool for becoming a better communicator. Visit http://3000messagesblog.com and start improving your communications today.
Featured article:
Five Ways to Increase the Effectiveness of Every Email You Send
In this Lingo Training article, Ben Reed and John Reed present five excellent tips that will help you write better emails. It's a great article to forward to your workgroup. Or, print it out and pin it on the breakroom wall at your office.
Download the article.
Featured book:
Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die
This is one of our favorites at Lingo Training. Written by brothers Chip and Dan Heath, Made to Stick is a landmark book on the power of effective communication. You'll learn what makes an idea "sticky" (memorable) and then you can apply that to your business. Here's an excerpt from the introduction:
“We wrote this book to help you make your ideas stick. By ‘stick,’ we mean that your ideas are understood and remembered, and have a lasting impact – they change your audience’s opinions or behavior.
“Given the importance of making ideas stick, it’s surprising how little attention is paid to the subject. When we get advice on communicating, it often concerns our delivery: ‘Stand up straight, make eye contact, use appropriate hand gestures. Practice, practice, practice (but don’t sound canned).’ Sometimes we get advice about structure: ‘Tell ’em what you’re going to tell ’em. Tell ’em, then tell ’em what you told ’em.’ Or ‘Start by getting their attention – tell a joke or a story.’
“Another genre concerns knowing your audience: ‘Know what your listeners care about, so you can tailor your communication to them.’ And, finally, there’s the most common refrain in the realm of communication advice: Use repetition, repetition, repetition.
“All of this advice has obvious merit, except, perhaps, for the emphasis on repetition. (If you have to tell someone the same thing ten times, the idea probably wasn’t very well designed. No urban legend has to be repeated ten times.) But this set of advice has one glaring shortcoming: It doesn’t help Art Silverman as he tries to figure out the best way to explain that movie popcorn is really unhealthful.
“Or think about an elementary-school teacher. She knows her goal: to teach the material mandated by the state curriculum committee. She knows her audience: third graders with a range of knowledge and skills. She knows how to speak effectively – she’s a virtuoso of posture and diction and eye contact. So the goal is clear, the audience is clear, and the format is clear. But the design of the message itself is far from clear. The biology students need to understand mitosis – okay, now what? There are an infinite number of ways to teach mitosis. Which way will stick? And how do you know in advance?”
