personal branding – MEMORANDUM

5 Tips for Writing on Social Media

man holding smartphone with social media alerts — Image courtesy of Adobe Stock

5 Tips for Writing on Social Media

By Erica Turner

Social media is one of the most popular communication outlets people use in the 21st century. Many utilize social media as a way to develop their brand or business and to reach people all over the world. As writers, we have to be innovative when reaching vast audiences and getting them to view our brand or business. Here are five tips that can help improve your performance:

Write Great Headlines. A headline is the first thing, if not the only thing, a prospective reader will see when they scroll upon a post. Make sure your headline is impactful and states the real purpose of your post or page.
Use Action-Oriented Language. The purpose of using social media is to get your audience to do something, whether it’s to attend an event, purchase something or watch a video. By using interesting adjectives or even posing a question, you can draw in your reader to doing exactly what action you want them to perform.
Tailor Your Message. How you write your posts on Facebook should not be the same way you construct your posts on Twitter. Tailor your message depending on what network you are trying to reach your audience on. The content you share will perform differently depending on the social network.
Post with Purpose. Make sure that you’re not posting things blindly and that there is meaning behind what you post. Always keep in mind why you are posting, and make sure your content reflects that message.
Put Share Buttons at the Bottom of EVERY post. After you’ve constructed a beautifully written and innovative post, make sure the post is easily accessible for readers to share. By placing social media share buttons at the bottom of all posts, your content will then have the potential to spread to reach a wider audience.

With these tips, you can create social media posts your audience will find captivating and shareable.

Business Writing for Every Major: An Interview with Dr. Cynthia Ryan

By Adele Leon

What is your professional identity? What can you do as a college student at UAB to start creating this identity? Where can you go to learn how to brand yourself? Dr. Cynthia Ryan’s Business Writing class can help you answer these questions.As a member of the Professional Writing Program at UAB, Dr. Ryan teaches students across the disciplines how to create their professional identities for years through a split-level class.

I Need this Class!

Dr. Ryan will likely be teaching Business Writing in Spring 2017. To be prepared for the class, Dr. Ryan says that you need to know what’s going on in the world, and every student should have a regular news feed of current events. This class is listed as an English class, but it is typically filled with students from the Business, Education, Psychology and Communications Departments—just to name a few. This class doesn’t just help students create professional identities; students who enroll in this course will also learn:

How to rhetorically connect to their own brands
How their personal slogans will make them stand out against the competition
How to connect their identities to any constituency

It is important to start developing your professional identity now while you are still a student. Taking this class will open your professional network to the Association for Business Communication, and provide you with an opportunity to join the Ethics Bowl Team at UAB.

This class also covers common skills every student should know in both professional and personal settings. Dr. Ryan teaches students how to operate in a corporate setting—from writing professional emails to presenting themselves professionally and delivering a complete strategy statement. These skills will help students navigate any corporate environment. Rhetorically, students who are enrolled in this class will a

dvance every aspect of their professional identities.

On a more personal level, this class will teach students how to negotiate—their interests, their personal presence, their goals—to succeed in their own branding.

Corporate Communication Textbook — “Corporate Communication” by Paul A. Argenti

Now picture yourself in a classroom full of people like you—people who are ready to start building their professional images. You are looking at Corporate Communication by Paul A. Argenti.

Dr. Ryan walks in and asks you, “What is your professional identity? How will you present that identity in your career?”

How will you answer?

Dr. Ryan will teach you how to answer those questions successfully. Dr. Ryan already has advice for you right now: The key to being successful in 2016 is being able to adapt your professional presence to all genres and conventions of the corporate world. But there are no hard and fast rules in business writing.

Generally, every genre of business writing changes depending on the context. For example, there is no existing standard for memos or business letters that is consistent on Google.

This class will give you more than just example memos and business letters, it will teach you how to navigate different types of corporate climates. But most importantly, Dr. Ryan will ask you to work from your own interests so you can build the professional identity you want for yourself.

If you want to get to know Dr. Ryan a little more before you sign up for her class, check out her blog. You’ll read about how she survived cancer, her travels and how she uses her personal identity to guide the life she wants to live.

Why Do We Give a CRAP?

By Luke Richey

Discovering Design

Visual Rhetoric Flyer — Visual Rhetoric flyer

Design permeates virtually all aspects of professional communication—from writing resumés, memos and cover letters to pitching a new product line or advertising an upcoming event. How that information looks matters and can be the difference between it being picked up or thrown away.

Backtrack to Fall 2014, when I had just entered my first professional writing course at UAB and was asked to design the cover for that issue of MEMORANDUM with absolutely no idea what or how to design.

Being a complete novice at the medium, I searched for help anywhere I could find it. Between Robin Williams’ (not the comedian) book, The Non-Designer’s Design Book, and a fellow UAB student and graphic design major, I learned a few tips that could help any professional writing student who wants to start dabbling in design.

Williams stresses the need, when designing, to make CRAP—but the good kind of CRAP. Williams’ CRAP stands for Contrast, repetition, Alignment and Proximity. Which, in a nutshell, means:

make the design stand out and create an impression on the viewer
introduce and repeat common themes throughout the work
do not throw space on the page haphazardly
organize elements in a way that makes the design “flow” well

When designing, a balance between consistency and contrast creates an effective and appealing design that grabs the viewer’s attention and keeps them interested. When designing, nothing should be arbitrary. Words, images, figures, etc. should work well together to enhance the composition rather than of weaken it.

Identify, Inspect, Innovate

From the graphic design student, whose name unfortunately eludes me, I learned to play with colors and fonts, get inspiration from other sources, and make the design unique—tailoring it to my own preferences.

Design can be fun; don’t be afraid to play around and look for things that appeal to you. And yes, it’s alright to look at other designs and other people’s work. This inspiration can spark a concept—an image—that takes from that design and works well with what’s already visualized in your head.

Finally, remember to create your own brand, a design that is unique to you and your personality. Just like writing, creating a design that does not fit you can come off as stale and uninteresting. Trial and error is always a part of the process and will make your designs that much better.

If you’re interested in understanding more of the basics concerning the four principles of design, Williams’ book can be purchased here.

Finding Your Professional Identity In Fonts

By Jay Haywood

three examples of font — Convey the right message with your font choice

When transitioning from the academic to professional world, several decisions are made to ensure getting a job.

Accomplishments, work experience and internships are all compiled into résumés and adjusted to fit a potential career. However, a résumé should not just be a reflection of a person’s work history. The document should also reflect the identity of the person submitting it. Otherwise, your résumé will blend in with a stack of other listing similar education and work experience.

Reflecting academia, Times New Roman is an industry standard of typefaces. In terms of fonts, it is clean, concise, and professional. It is easy to read when formatted smaller and leads the eye easily when going through a document with lots of information on it. However, Times New Roman is also everywhere, which means that it can also be perceived as bland, unthoughtful and lazy.

Some people assume that they are expected to create their résumé in Times New Roman, partly because they wrote with the font for their entire college career. There are great alternatives to the font that will help identify you as an individual while still looking professional.

If you are looking to change your style but still want to stick close to traditional fonts, consider a font called Calisto MT, found within Microsoft Word. Stylistically it seems similar to Times New Roman, as it contains serifs, and is easy to read at a small typeface. However, the weight, or thickness, of Calisto MT is slightly heavier than Times New Roman, creating a layer of depth that is lacking in the latter.

If you are looking to branch out even more, consider a sans-serif font. Sans-serif fonts are regarded as clean and modern, and can definitely help a résumé stand out. I found a font called Lato on Google Fonts, a service provided for free through Google, that is an excellent choice. When compared to Times New Roman, Lato seems sleek and contemporary.

While both of these fonts are great examples, they may not represent you, and that’s fine! Browse the web to find a font that reflects you both personally and professionally.

The True First Impression of a Job Applicant

line of people sitting for an interview — Image courtesy of Adobe Stock

By Rebecca Martin

The job search process can be daunting, especially when it comes to creating a resume. Much attention is given to the content of the resume but the truth is that the appearance is just as important, if not more so.

Having worked as a recruiting specialist for four and a half years, I know that appearance can put a resume on the top of the stack or the bottom, or sometimes even in the trash. The decision is made before a single word is read.

Think of it like this: you dress according to how you want to appear for a job interview. The same applies to your resume. Just remember that employers are people too. Having been one of those employers, I can give a little insight into the thought process when looking at a resume:

A resume that clearly did not take any effort says that you do not really care about the job. If you do not put in the effort to write it, why should I in reading it?
Time is money. So a first glance can tell if your resume is organized and makes the desired info easy to pick out.
Resumes are boring. They blur together. So a resume that catches the eye is more apt to be read first.

So what should you do? Start with a font. Times New Roman gets pretty old and really does not make an impression. Just do not go crazy; you want your resume to look professional. It is not the time to show your personality flair.

Use lines, bullets, and a border. Separate sections with lines then bold the title of each section. Bullets are great for listing information and making it stand out. Long blocky paragraphs are not likely to be read. Finally, a simple border can actually do a lot for the overall look.

Regent University has a great page that shows how they transformed a very blah resume to a better-looking resume. While still very simple, you can see the transformation process and the difference it makes.

There are plenty of places to see examples of resumes online or get templates. Online Resume Builder has some great ones that are even sorted by the type job you are looking for. Just remember that your resume is your first impression when finding a job.

Social Media: Personal Branding

Social media marketing is everywhere. Professional writing majors can easily take advantage of this continually growing job market.

Before you apply for a social media editor position, you need to use social media to market yourself. Create a strategy similar to one used by a business, but tweak it to attract companies to you! There are several different platforms you may want to consider to distribute your personal image.

Linked In is an essential network for making professional connections with peers and companies alike. It is also has myriad advertising opportunities for businesses, so those considering a career in copy writing or social media will want to have a strong presence and understanding of the site. Writers can also publish content on Linked In, providing a portfolio presented in a professional network setting. Publishing on a social network and demonstrating an ability to engage others can be extremely valuable when applying for jobs.

Twitter has been around for a while, but this real-time social media site still has so much potential. Be specific in the content you post and retweet. No one wants their feed clogged with photos of your dinner; post tweets that provide engaging content. Always read articles before posting to ensure legitimacy and relevance to your target market. This can also be a vital tool in engaging followers for blogging.

Though Facebook has allegedly been on the downswing with younger audiences, a great majority use this site daily for news and entertainment. In addition, Facebook advertising is extremely profitable. You can also personalize your Facebook to carefully portray your brand image. Above all, take time to edit and filter old posts, or if high school you was just “2 kool 4 skool,” or equally as embarrassing, delete the whole thing and start fresh.

Snapchat’s story feature can be used as a way to personally engage readers in visual rhetoric. For example, Lucky Magazine Editor Eva Chen will create a story full of visual content from events she attends, such as New York Fashion Week. This social media app makes brands, and personal brands, have a story-telling component with very few words. This can be a valuable tool for creating a relationship with consumers, as there is no “following” but only “friends.” You may not want to “friend” all the companies you want to work for, but it is nonetheless the newest thing for company image branding.

Creating an effective personal brand presence can result in a social media editing position. Apply for social media internships after establishing a social media portfolio (your personal brand) and see what happens.