Informality and Professional Prose

Casual business writing can be tricky: how can you make your Web copy sound welcoming, yet professionally credible? If you’re concerned that your prose may sound sloppy rather than casual, grammar rules can offer you some safe and reliable guidelines.

Here are some nonstandard sentences in a pleasant T magazine article about Blue Bottle Coffee. The magazine’s handwritten text emphasizes the quotes’ intentional informality:

 

"James what's fun about coffee?" "everything! coffee is tangible. It is not made of ones and zeroes. It makes us smarter, funnier, healthier and is delicious."

Since the first line is a question, standard English would require a comma after the name. Of course, the first words of the sentences would also be capitalized.

A businessperson might frown at the grammar of that last sentence if it were part of a formal commercial mission statement. Here’s a revised, correct sentence about coffee: “It makes us smarter, funnier, and healthier, and it is delicious.”

A little knowledge of parallel verb structure is all you’d need to dress up the informal look of this prose and feel sure that it’s appropriate for a formal business document.

Do you have an important document but not enough time to double-check your punctuation or untangle your sentences? Just use Write It Well’s editing services to make sure your readers follow your ideas and respect your voice.

Write It Well’s book Essential Grammar includes a section on parallel verb structure and two full chapters on punctuation.

We’ve made all the book’s exercises available as a free download here to accompany the e-book, which is now available on Amazon.com!