by Elle Ray | Jul 9, 2018 | Writing
What You Should Include When You Write a Bio
In business and journalism lingo, a bio is short for biography. One of the reasons it’s short is because it’s not a book, nor is it a resume or a lengthy history. At the same time, when you write a bio, there are a number of different iterations you may consider.
After all, your life has many twists, turns and triumphs, and not all are appropriate for every venue or reader. The parts to share in your bio depend on the audience for whom you’re writing it. The length depends on your purpose. The form it takes depends on who/what/where/why/when/how factors:
- Who you expect to read your words
- What your bio accompanies (e.g., a book, report or presentation)
- Where you plan on publishing your bio
- Why you need a bio
- When it needs to be ready
- How detailed it needs to be
Write a Bio for Your Website
Today, a website is a common platform to place your bio. A bio on a website typically goes under a link entitled Meet Our Team or About Us (see ours). You may even include your bio on your homepage if it seems appropriate. This strategy not only identifies you to your visitors, it also provides extra copy to make the page search-engine friendly by creating long-form content.
When you write a bio for your website, the length and style should be driven by:
- The tone you take on the rest of your site
- The industry that you’re representing
- Your target market or audience
For example, if you’re a physician, you don’t want to write a bio with information about how you play with your cat on weekends, although it may be prudent to include information about your fitness activities. On the other hand, if you’re a local plumber, your customers may want to know that you’re pet-friendly, but they won’t care so much if you’re in shape or not.
The length of a bio on your website shouldn’t be longer than 500 words, or you risk losing the interest — and respect — of your readers. Don’t bore them with irrelevant details. Shoot for a balance of education, experience, interests and passions. Remember that consumers and companies do business with people and firms that they like, so make yourself likeable.
Write a Bio to Find Work
Another common place where you may need to write a bio for is on your social media platforms, particularly on LinkedIn. Your LinkedIn bio is known as your profile (see ours), but its purpose is the same. It’s still a bio, a shorted version of your biography or life story, just geared to business and business experience.
And it can reflect a little more personality than your resume normally does. Job-hunting requires taking advantage of every possible avenue to show off your skills, attitude, background and goals. As on your resume, you can’t lie, but you can make yourself look as positive as possible. Have you enjoyed some success? Tout it! Accomplished something special? Brag on it!
You can use the bio that you create for your social media in a cover letter that gets attached to your resume when applying for a job. If it’s well done, it speaks to your strengths, which is what an employer wants to see. Add a salutation, a signature and few more salient lines, and it’s good to go!
Write a Bio for a Press Release
Probably the shortest form of self-promotion and introduction goes into a press release. Press releases, which Ray Access writes, never should be longer than one page. And that includes everything! You want to hit the highlights so that media types can get just enough information to whet their appetites. You want them to be hungry for more.
Remember your audience when sending out a press release. News organizations, magazine writers, funders and successful bloggers take mere seconds to read a press release, so yours needs to be just that — a condensed version of your Best Of. At a minimum, it may contain only your title, contact information and one anecdote or feature.
Write a Bio for Other Reasons
Maybe you need a bio to tag onto an application for a board seat. Perhaps your alumni organization wants one for the next reunion magazine. Whatever the reason, writing about yourself is one of the most difficult tasks imaginable for some people. Writing bios never should be so overwhelming that the process shuts you down.
You can always call on Ray Access to write a bio for all the various places you may need one, even if the need arises for something unique. We have the advantage of having former journalists on staff. Journalists are adept at honing down to the truth.
If you hire a writer for your bio, she may need to interview you to really get a feel for your personality — especially if you need a bio that expresses your true self. If that’s too much of a bother, you can complete a short questionnaire, which is good enough if you just need a bio to match the others in your firm.
Ray Access is a content marketing firm that delivers targeted words to empower your business. Contact us about your specific project to receive a quote or discuss your needs. We write website copy, blog posts, e-newsletters and more. Everything we do is thoroughly researched, professionally edited and guaranteed original.
by Elle Ray | May 28, 2018 | Writing
Like All Web Pages, You Must Update Your Bio
If you’re a queen at what you do, update your bio to toot your horn!
Your bio is a way to put a face on your business, whether you’re a solopreneur, a freelancer or the head of a web development firm. Potential clients who’ve found your website may want to take a look at who they may be doing business with before you meet. It’s a way to show off your creative flair or your professional demeanor. A bio on your website also provides clients with frames of reference for:
- Where you live
- Where you went to school
- What your hobbies are
- What kind of family you have
- How long you’ve been in your industry
- What credentials you bring to the table
- And other important (or fun) facts
You should update your bio when you first create your website. At the same time, you should update your bio on your social media sites, especially business-related sites like LinkedIn, where your business associates are most likely to look for your background information.
Remember Why You Have a Bio
Name recognition is highly valued in business. Consider the enormous amount of time you’ve spent building your brand. Since you’re an integral part of that brand, whether you interact with the public or not, it behooves you to put your best face forward. Building your brand and encouraging potential clients to contact you are reasons enough to make sure your bio is up-to-date.
Website developers, for example, rarely meet with clients face-to-face if they’re spread out all over the world. (In fact, Ray Access has clients as far away as Singapore!) Yet readers and clients who’re thinking of hiring some geek to create their website still want — and inherently need — to know the person who’s going to help them create an online impression.
If you don’t update your bio on a regular basis, those clients won’t get to know the most recent body of work you’ve completed. They won’t know about any awards and credentials you’ve earned recently, and they won’t know what you look like now. Face it, a picture of a goofy college grad doesn’t carry as much weight as an experienced and dedicated 40-something.
Update Your Bio Now
When you think it’s about time to update your bio, it’s probably past time to get it done. Some say that a biographical account of you and your accomplishments should be updated every six months. Consider tweaking your online brand at least once a year.
A lot can happen in a year. Think of everything you’ve done in the past year worth crowing about! Besides, looking at and reviewing your bio annually forces you to stop and ask yourself important questions, such as:
- Is your brand still relevant?
- Is the bio as complete as it can be?
- Does your bio and that of your employees still express your values and mission?
- Can your potential clients relate to you?
- Are you being relatable?
If you answered “no” to any one of those questions, then it’s time to update your bio. Do it soon because every day you don’t may be a missed opportunity to impress a potential client.
DIY or Hire a Pro to Write It
A country-and-western song famously alluded to the fact that sometimes it’s hard to be humble when you’re so darn great. But for most people, humility is not the issue. In fact, too much humility can hold you back. And when it comes to your bio, maybe you’re the last person who should write it.
If you haven’t hired a professional biographer — and who has? — then turn to a professional writer, interviewer and former journalist, like the experts at Ray Access, who can ask you the right questions to capture an alluring personality and state all the reasons people should do business with you.
Ready to update your bio?
Call on the professionals at Ray Access. We can give you a one-page bio for your website, a shorthand version for your social sites and a couple of one-lines for your marketing materials. We’ll take the humble with the greatness and turn it into a thoughtful, true rendition of you — one that represents you today, not the old you of yesterday.
by Elle Ray | Mar 27, 2018 | Writing
How to Protect Your Wrists & Hands from Harm
Writers and editors spend much of their days at the keyboard, so they’re prone to carpal tunnel syndrome. A devastating medical condition, carpal tunnel syndrome keeps you from typing — and therefore from working — for quite a while. While not everyone develops the condition, you may have some unhealthy habits that can lead to hand and wrist problems.
The carpal tunnel is the rigid, narrow passageway on the back of each hand, through which tendons and nerves pass to your fingers. It’s a pretty sturdy tunnel, but continuous pressure can eventually cause it to cave. Its lining can become inflamed and swollen too, also leading to pain and disability. Carpal tunnel syndrome occurs when the median nerve running through the tunnel gets squeezed at your wrist.
Carpal Tunnel Syndrome Symptoms
When your carpal tunnel becomes damaged or inflamed, the pain alone can send you far from your keyboard. And the treatment makes it difficult to continue with your work as well. Common painful symptoms include:
- Numbness in that hand
- Weakness in your wrist, fingers or hand
- Pain in your hand or wrist
- Pain that travels up through your forearm
- Tingling or burning in the palm of your hand
- Thumb muscles become atrophied
The symptoms often begin at night and may wake you up. Or when you do arise in the morning, it feels like you have to shake your hand to get feeling back into it; it feels like your hand fell asleep and didn’t hear the alarm. When symptoms start affecting you during the day, that’s a sign the condition is getting worse. Eventually, you may not be able to feel hot or cold in that hand.
Don’t Write It Off
While repetitive stress and improper ergonomics often are the main culprits, there are other causes, such as:
- An underdeveloped tunnel
- Fluid retention
- An injury to the tunnel, such as a sprain or fracture of your hand
- Rheumatoid arthritis
- Pituitary gland problem
- Tumor or cyst pressing on the carpal tunnel
- Diabetes
With so many factors at play, it’s best to get it checked out by a physician who may take an x-ray or MRI, do blood tests, and provide hands-on manipulation to identify the underlying cause and give you a definitive diagnosis. Self-diagnosing isn’t a good idea, especially when it comes to your hands that are your source of income!
Prevention Is the Best Line of Defense
It may seem that writers and editors don’t do much in the way of physical exertion. And very often, writers place so much emphasis on the mental challenges of the job that just the thought of it being physically challenging seems ludicrous. However, writing on a keyboard or by hand is very taxing work.
And if you do it improperly, you’re going to feel the results — in your hands, your back, your shoulders, your neck and beyond. Your body is so interconnected that, like a string of dominoes, when one part goes down, the rest follow closely behind.
Take It Seriously
Taking into consideration the risks of continuing your unhealthy work habits should encourage you to take care of your money-makers. Make some simple changes now. Examine how you work, where you do your writing and what kind of equipment you rely on. You just may save yourself from some heavy-duty carpal tunnel syndrome treatment.
Simple modifications make your work feel better and stack the odds against you having hand problems. Tips for changes include:
- Correct your posture to allow the blood to flow smoothly to your extremities.
- Adjust the arms on your chair so that your arms rest gently on them while you type. Don’t press down on your arm or wrists — that could shut off blood flow and compromise your carpal tunnel.
- Lose the wrist rests. A common typing tool when ergonomics first hit the office scene, it’s now known that your wrists should never rest on anything for more than a few seconds.
- Get up and move around at least for five to 10 minutes every hour. Movement helps to shift waste products out that can clog up your veins and restrict circulation.
- Do wrist exercises before, during and after a writing session. Straighten out your arm and hold it steady with the opposite hand. Move your wrist in one direction for a minute, then reverse. Make sure you do both wrists, even if only one is hurting.
- Stretch during another of your breaks. Reach for the ceiling and pull your arms gently up to give your muscles and blood vessels a slight tug.
- Boost your circulatory system by adding foods high in B6 to your diet. Avocados, eggs, whole wheat, bananas and peanuts are just some of the foods rich in B vitamins, and B vitamins are good for your blood.
If you’re already feeling some early symptoms and your doctor approves, try wearing a splint at night while you sleep. If the pain continues to worsen, you may need to wear it during the day too. You may have to learn how to type while wearing it.
A custom-made splint may help. If all else fails, you may need to have surgery. At that point, we hope you have a good transcriber or a voice recognition program to type for you!
Ray Access is a content marketing firm that delivers targeted words to empower your business. Contact us about your specific project to receive a quote or discuss your needs. We write website copy, blog posts, e-newsletters and more. Everything we do is thoroughly researched, professionally edited and guaranteed original.
by Elle Ray | Mar 13, 2018 | Writing
Brain Food Helps Fuel Your Creative Juices
Coffee isn’t brain food; don’t rely on it to spark your creativity.
Every day, we’re bombarded with advice about what we need to put in our bodies to become:
- A better athlete
- A more efficient worker
- Safe from outside influences
- A growing teen
- An aging senior
- A healthy middle-aged anybody
But you barely see any advice for what brain food and nutrition can help you better use your noggin to be more creative, think outside the common areas of the park or tap into hidden sources of inspiration. The mind/body connection has clearly been defined and proven beyond any reasonable doubt. Yet creativity and inspiration still too often get left primarily to the unseen, mysterious realms of spirituality and/or religion.
Brain Food for Thought
While new technology or updated apps on all your devices might make them smarter, they actually do little for your own brain. In fact, the internet, Google and all other higher forms of the internet of things (IoT) has indeed given humans the ability to find, extract and process information quicker than ever – in effect, making us smarter. But rarely can technology and its spurious offspring act as brain food for higher levels of thinking – like art, prose and music.
Instead, consider relying on the research that does inform the human brain to produce effectively and efficiently. In other words, eat more brain food, and you can become more creative. Some of the best foods for higher thinking include:
- Dark chocolate. A cup of dark hot chocolate provides more antioxidants than green tea or red wine, two other common sources of drinkable brain food.
- Broccoli. A natural source of vitamin K, broccoli plays a huge role in blood coagulation in your brain, which keeps the blood and fat in your brain modulated, balanced and stress-free.
- Eggs. This is your brain on eggs: smoothly operating as ideas fire off one after another. Eggs are a good source of the neurotransmitter acetylcholine that helps cells in your brain communicate with one another. It also fosters a better memory.
- Fish. The omega-3 fatty acids contained in fish – like salmon, mackerel and tuna – act like weights for building your creative muscles. As far as brain food goes, these little fatty acids are hard to beat.
- Blueberries. Now this is one all-around powerful brain food. It should fill your freezer and fruit basket every day. Not only are blueberries a superb source of antioxidants, they also boost the production of good sugar, or glucose, in the body. And since your brain can’t store glucose for later use, like fat or muscles in other parts of your body, your brain needs a constant supply to keep it fresh and healthily creative so it can spin out new ideas.
Blueberries are amazing brain food!
Supplementing Bad Food with Brain Food
One of the biggest zappers in terms of healthy nutrition is processed food, which also contains harmful chemicals that only work to derail concentration, creativity and constructive ideas. Ideally, every working writer needs fresh, organic live foods that haven’t been processed. Even if you’re just noodling around on the keyboard and haven’t yet decided whether to publish or not, beware of processed food. It’s not your best source of nourishment.
So you say you can’t afford fresh fruits and veggies every day? So you’re not a very cook? You’re the type of writer who gets started on a project and forgets to stop and eat? If you can’t make a daily habit of consuming fresh, wholesome brain food, you can make up for your lack of nutrients with supplements designed just for this purpose.
Talk to your doctor, though, before starting on a regimen of supplements. Some of them may counteract other medications you may be taking. Some supplements even require oversight by a medical professional if you have any medical conditions or plan on taking huge doses to counteract an imbalance.
Brain Food Musts
It’s always better to get most of your brain food from actual real food, but when you can’t, supplements can take up some of the slack, as long as you don’t overdo it or go against your doctor’s recommendations. But every day, make sure you consume sufficient amounts of:
- Antioxidants. These nutrients are important for reducing and even eliminating inflammation. Brain cells are particularly susceptible to damage from oxidation and free radicals. In addition to boosting your brain’s cognitive functions, antioxidants also slow down the aging process. Early research suggests they may even reduce your chances of developing Alzheimer’s or dementia. Get your daily dose of antioxidants from supplements like vitamins A, C and E.
- Fat. Yes, fat. It’s not necessarily a put-down when someone calls you a “fat-head.” Dietary fat is an essential brain food, as the organ is made up of nearly 60 percent fat. And not only does healthy fat serve as exceptional brain food, it makes you happier too. Inadequate dietary fat consumption is tied to depression. Fish oil supplements may be the best source of fat supplementation when you can’t get your fill of fish, nuts, olives or avocados.
- Protein. Those neurotransmitters that thrive on eggs every day are primarily made of proteins. They’re responsible for your mood too, as well as moderating sleep and addictive cravings, more things that can get in the way of your creative production. A heap of protein powder might suffice on days that you can’t consume enough eggs, meat or dairy.
- B Vitamins. In particular, a deficiency in vitamin B-12 leads to a condition called brain fog that definitely will interfere with your writing. But all B vitamins are good for you in the right doses.
- Vitamin D. While your body and brain need a daily dose of all essential vitamins and minerals, a lack of B-12 and vitamin D are most common because it isn’t easy to get your daily dosages from food. And too many people, especially writers, don’t spend enough time in the sun to get enough of this brain boosting nutrient. Vitamin D is often referred to as the happy vitamin for its ability to improve your mood and your memory.
When all is said and done, it’s really just common sense that dictates anyone’s diet. But unlike steel workers and aerobics teachers who burn enough calories in a day so they can get all the nutrition they need from food without gaining weight, sedentary writers need to watch their caloric intake. And fat writers aren’t as productive either, since they have other medical issues that too often short-circuit their creativity.
So, feed your brain with healthy brain food meant for Pulitzer Prize-winning writers – and all the rest of us. And keep your brain exercised by writing every day. A good diet and exercise: the keys to good health and creative success!
Ray Access is a content marketing firm that delivers targeted words to empower your business. Contact us about your specific project to receive a quote or discuss your needs. We write website copy, blog posts, e-newsletters and more. Everything we do is thoroughly researched, professionally edited and guaranteed original.
by Elle Ray | Feb 27, 2018 | Writing
Consider Both When You’re Writing for Fun
Whether you’re writing for fun or writing for profit, following the same simple principles helps you go further in your literary endeavors. All writing should be designed to be read. It doesn’t matter whether you’re:
- Writing for profit, hoping to get more work from freelance efforts
- Already on staff as a professional writer
- Just writing for fun because you enjoy the process
Writing that isn’t read is like a painting kept in an attic or a new dress left on its hangar – what’s the point? Just as a goal without a plan is just a wish, so writing that isn’t read is lost seed on infertile ground.
Writing for Fun vs. Writing for Personal Use
To be clear, writing for fun doesn’t include journals or diaries. First of all, those kinds of musings typically aren’t written to be read by anyone else. Instead, personal writing meant for your eyes only is a therapeutic process, best left to yourself or your therapist.
Letter writing – designed to be read by only one other person, including love letters, letters of apology and notes serving as reminders – may be called writing for fun if you get a kick out of doing it. It’s kind of a lost art today, but if you write to your recipient on a regular basis, maybe that’s a fun exercise for you. But again, that’s not the kind of writing for fun this article addresses.
Don’t Look Now!
The best kind of writing for fun is the kind that too many writers believe is not suited for others’ eyes. For example, if you’ve jotted down a short story in your spare time, but are worried what friends, family or even strangers may think of you – in other words, if you’re afraid of criticism – then you should reveal it immediately. Announce its existence and don’t hold back!
Just as the journalist braves the insensitive red pen of the editor and the novelist cringes when her editor calls, you must learn to accept constructive criticism with a fearless heart and an optimistic grin. It’s not just the best way to grow your talent, it’s the only way. By allowing others to read their work, professionals become better writers. You will too.
You may tell yourself you’re just writing for fun, but writing truly is a serious business. You need some skill, certainly, but becoming a writer, even if for fun, takes work. Some would even go so far as to say that a writer who doesn’t share her talent is no better than a person who can’t write at all. Don’t let that describe you.
Writing for Profit Isn’t Always Fun
Professional writers often express extreme envy and outrage at the thought of writers writing just for fun. Real writers, they believe, write. Every day. And they post or publish their writing; they don’t keep it to themselves. Professional writers have to meet their boss’ expectations, even if they’re writing:
- Blog posts
- Website pages
- Novels
- Magazine articles
- Newspaper stories
- Press releases
- Marketing brochures
“What I wouldn’t give to be able to write what I want to write and be damned if anyone bothers to pay for it!” That’s a common lament among those who write for profit. Yes, even novelists have publishers and a public to please. It’s often enough to take all the fun out of the job.
Marry Writing for Fun with Writing for Profit
The best of both worlds involves taking bits and pieces from each and creating a writer’s life few ever get the chance to enjoy. Perhaps when talented writers overcome the fear of rejection or ridicule and relegate their inner critic to a back room with the door locked, more great writing will be published. Don’t let those voices in your head stop you. Write to be read!
On the other hand, talent may emerge from professional writers who spent a lifetime writing for profit. When those writers retire, the skills learned from writing for profit get turned into writing for fun. Or maybe even someone like you will finally allow the world to see your writing. Once you stop kidding yourself that you’re only writing for fun, put it – and your talent – to the test. Submit your work. Encourage people to read it. Embrace your inner writer.
Ray Access is a content marketing firm that delivers targeted words to empower your business. Contact us about your specific project to receive a quote or discuss your needs. We write website copy, blog posts, e-newsletters and more. Everything we do is thoroughly researched, professionally edited and guaranteed original.
by Elle Ray | Jan 30, 2018 | Writing
Expert Advice on Learning from Your Editor
Writers write.
Practice makes perfect.
The best writers are avid readers.
There are enough clichés and witticisms to fill buckets with well-intentioned advice on how to be a better writer. And since writing is one of those tasks that most people loathe – in fact, many would rather face a root canal than write a 500-word blog post – those words of wisdoms usually fall to the bottom of a dry well and stay trapped there forever. Good intentions, after all, pave the path to hell.
And while the best advice, cliché or not, holds plenty of truth, there are many more practical, pedantic steps that you need to take to learn how to be a better writer. So take a teaspoon of sugar to help this medicine go down a little easier, as you swallow the following tips to be a better writer:
- Take writing classes from people you respect
- Write for teachers, mentors or colleagues who don’t hold back criticism
- Accept criticism; that’s the way you learn
- Welcome criticism so you can grow as a writer
- Ask for more criticism because only the dead stop learning
- Lose your defenses; be vulnerable, honest and open to good advice
- Drop the excuses and keep writing; you improve by doing
- Hire a good editor and you’ll learn more than you’d imagine
The Magnificent Birth of a Sentence
When you put your heart and a bit of your soul – not to mention a good chunk of your valuable time – into an article, story or blog post, you feel invested. It’s natural to be protective of your chosen phrases and cool alliterations. You may even get mushy, as many writers do, and think of your prose as your children, since they were born in your brain, slid down your arms to your hands and ended up on the page.
You may have sweat over each revision until you were sure you got it exactly right. Getting up in the middle of the night with just the right opening sentence is truly a thrill that gives any writer, professional or amateur, kind of a rush. It’s a grand morning that starts out with your muse in full regalia.
Then the Evil Editor Pounces
But the feeling doesn’t last. By the time you turn in your beloved “masterpiece,” a sense of dread hovers over you like a dark cloud you can’t shake. You may even hit the Send button believing, at least deep down, that it isn’t quite your very best work. But you love it anyway. It’s all yours and no one can take that away from you.
Until your editor does exactly that. That evil writer-wannabe sits all high and mighty on her throne, just waiting to cut your work to shreds. You have a feeling that she just loves to pick it apart, to rip your precious babies into a mish-mash of obscurity that you don’t even recognize. With your ego screaming in denial and your sense of self-worth lying in tatters on the floor, you think that the last thing your editor ever wants to do is to help you be a better writer.
Feedback Feeds Your Talent
Whether your editor does just a word-by-word line edit, correcting your grammar and deleting clichés, or rearranges your copy so that it flows better, it’s feedback you need to listen to. Instead of throwing a tantrum and whining like a baby, take it like a professional. Swallow your pride, and force your ego to pay attention. Those characteristics are merely protecting you, not helping you be a better writer.
In actuality, pride and ego are the enemies of greatness. You can practice all day, every day. You can surround yourself with readers who feed your ego and tell you only good things about your writing. And one day you’ll realize that you’ll never be a better writer. You need criticism. You need someone telling you to improve. If you don’t want to learn, then stop now. If you accept mediocrity, then don’t use a skilled editor.
Be a Better Writer … with Help and Humility
But without an editor willing to tear your work apart, any raw talent you have will remain undeveloped. It’s like walking around with your skirt tucked into your panties and not listening to anyone trying to tell you. It’s like going on stage with spinach in your front teeth and not understanding why people are laughing at you.
Read the acknowledgements in most best-sellers, and you’ll notice that even famous authors always mention their editors. Good editors are those selfless professionals who have only one goal: to create the best reading experience possible. And by succeeding, they help create a better writer.
An experienced editor knows: you will rise to the occasion if you have the talent; you will write the next book better if you have the drive; and you will be a better writer today than you were yesterday if you have the inclination to learn. When you rely on your scolding, caring, prodding, exacting editor – one who doesn’t hesitate to wield her axe to mold your message and massage your babies until they sing with joy – you’ll not only fashion a story that moves your readers, but you’ll also be a better writer.
Ray Access is a content marketing firm that delivers targeted words to empower your business. Contact us about your specific project to receive a quote or discuss your needs. We write website copy, blog posts, e-newsletters and more. Everything we do is thoroughly researched, professionally edited and guaranteed original.
