Write What You Mean: The ABCs of Grammar and Spelling for Social Media

 By Mary Kate Smither, Social Media Practice Leader

In our business, clients rely on us every day to help reach their business objectives by communicating messages correctly and effectively. While I love social media, and all of the opportunities it offers us to engage with each other about those messages, I also believe that in some ways it has allowed us to compromise our skills for accurate grammar and spelling.

I admit that I’ve always been somewhat of a spelling and grammar snob, and I also acknowledge that we are all moving faster than ever to generate quality content and keep up with each other. But how many times have you read a tweet with so many letters missing you need a code to decipher it, or a blog post about a brand that includes grammatical errors, such as your instead of you’re, its instead of it’s or there instead of their? My guess is that if you’ve noticed some of these errors, your attention was diverted from the true message of the post.

Despite my acknowledged neuroses and the crazy speed of life, I still firmly believe that we all owe it to our clients and to ourselves to slow down long enough to ensure that we’re actually communicating what we mean to communicate. Twitter and Facebook posts, mobile messaging and blog entries are all an extension of ourselves and our brands, and isn’t the goal always to create a great first impression by putting your best foot forward?

As a public relations professional, not only do I want to make sure that my current clients are happy with my work and fans of our agency, but I also want to use my work as way to earn new business. How can I expect a potential client to have confidence in my ability to produce great work if I don’t know the proper usage of a word or its correct spelling?

While we live in a world where social media allows for a more informal conversation tone, and -- as humans mistakes certainly happen -- avoiding spelling and grammatical mistakes can be easy enough. The point is not to stop writing or tweeting, but to do it well. Following are a few resources to help make sure you put your best foot forward.

• Spell Check – While it doesn’t catch words that are spelled correctly but are grammatically incorrect, spell check is always a good first step in proofing a post, text or tweet. Most social media sites and many smartphones offer some form of spell check application.

• Find a Friend – Sometimes we’re so close to our own work, that we miss what’s right in front of our faces. Enlist a colleague or friend to help proof your blog posts, especially if you’re writing them from a professional standpoint or on behalf of someone else.

• Dictionary – Not sure how to spell a word? No problem. It's true that the dictionary is an obvious go-to resource, but now both the Oxford English Dictionary and Merriam-Webster have made it easier than ever to check the spelling and meaning of a word with their online versions (Oxford English is a paid subscription, Merriam-Webster is free) at http://www.oed.com/ and http://www.merriam-webster.com/.

• AP Stylebook – Vital to those of us in the public relations profession, the AP Stylebook offers a guide to proper writing style, including grammar, punctuation , capitalization and is used by many media outlets as a standard. While many of us still use the print version of the book, AP now offers online subscriptions beginning at $25 (http://www.apstylebook.com/).

Wording of Letter Apparently Kills Deal to Buy Hospital

by Tony Shelton, Shelton & Caudle, a division of Vollmer PR

"My baby, she wrote me a letter.”   ...from The Letter by the Box Tops

These days, when your “Baby” is much more likely to text or tweet you than write, the nuances of letter writing can seem almost old-fashioned.

Everywhere, that is, except maybe in business. According to news reports today, the Harris County Hospital District backed out of a deal to buy a medical complex in southwest Houston from the Memorial Hermann Healthcare System, and the decision was based largely on the tone and wording of a letter sent by Memorial Hermann.

According to the Houston Chronicle, some apparently offensive elements of the letter included: use of demands and deadlines, the use of boldface type and “at least one exclamation point.”

Whatever the real impact of this one letter, it does give us reason to reconsider some basics of approaching the business letter.

• First we need to ask: What objective do we want this letter to achieve? Move the other person to act? Put him on the defensive?
• If there’s a negotiation going on, also consider how other communications are progressing, including phone conversations and face-to-face meetings.
• Who is the specific recipient of the letter? What’s the personality of that person, as well as of the organization? Is he or she open to direct language or likely to react strongly to something that seems like a demand?
• What’s the tone? Can we use neutral words, such as “challenge” instead of “problem”? Such choices can help soften the tone, which might have come across as accusatory or derogatory. (It’s also generally a good idea to skip the boldface type, underlining and exclamation points – all of which can seem like “shouting” on the page.)
• What’s the likely reaction to the letter you’ve drafted? If possible, show it to someone who’s not intimately involved in the negotiation and get an opinion.
• Finally, ask: If we’ve got tough issues to hammer out, is it really better to put them into a letter or should we try to work them out face to face?

If you’re in doubt, involve a communication expert. Vollmer’s counselors often work with companies and organizations involved in negotiations, mergers and acquisitions, as well as crises of all types.

Remember that a letter lacks the emotion and nuances that color conversation. That’s why it’s even more important to carefully consider every word -- and every exclamation point, too, Baby!