LibGuides: Business Writing: Business Writing Basics

Business Writing Overview

These resources provide a good starting point for an introduction and overview of business writing. These resources focus on the brainstorming, writing, and revision process for business documents.

Business Writing: An Introduction - Colorado State
This guide from Colorado State goes over preparation, research, organizing, drafting, and review and revision of business documents.
Writing in the Disciplines: Business, Getting Started - University of Richmond
This guide from the University of Richmond provides an overview of pre-writing, writing, and revising, as well as additional information on considering the message; writing for a specific audience, common mistakes, types of business communication, writing business proposals, writing in economics, writing in accounting, and writing in marketing.
General Guidelines for Business Writing - Purdue OWL
This guide from Purdue's OWL provides an overview of tone, writing with concision, foregrounding important information, and grammar and spelling.
Workplace Writers - Purdue OWL
This guide from Purdue's OWL covers a range of business writing skills such as effective workplace writing, audience analysis, tailoring employment documents by audience, prewriting, and other professional writing resources.

Business Writing Techniques

Tone in Business Writing

Tone in Business Writing - Purdue OWL
Some tips on how to write business documents with appropriate tone
Active and Passive Voice - George Mason University
This guide provides description and examples of active and passive voice in writing
Word Choice and Tone - Business Communication Skills for Managers
This chapter in the OER text covers language; bias free writing; concise writing; clarity; parallel construction; and emphasis

Concision in Business Writing

Concision - Purdue OWL
This guide goes over how to write concisely and provides examples on word choice and arrangement
Eliminating Words - Purdue OWL
This guide provides examples on how to write more concisely by eliminating obvious words, unnecessary modifiers, repetitive words, and redundant pairs
Changing Phrases - Purdue OWL
This guide provides an overview of changing long phrases into shorter phrases/single words and changing passive verbs into active verbs
Avoiding Common Pitfalls - Purdue OWL
This guide provides examples of common pitfalls that lead to wordiness, and gives tips for how to write more concisely
The Paramedic Method - Lessons in Writing Concisely - Purdue OWL
This handout provides steps and exercises to eliminate wordiness at the sentence level
Writing Concisely - George Mason University Writing Center
this guide provides tips to reduce wordiness and examples of concise writing

Prioritizing Concerns and Considering the Message in Business Writing

Considering the Message in Business Communications - University of Richmond
This guide goes over the different approaches for writing positive messages, requests for information, claims, replies, negative messages, and more.
Writing the Right Message - Business Communication Skills for Managers
This chapter from this OER textbook covers the following information: audience; downward and upward communication; horizontal communication; the right message; and positive, negative, and persuasive messages
Higher Order Concerns - Purdue OWL
This section focuses on the following four main higher order concerns: Focus and Purpose; Audience; Organization and Document Design; Development

Audience Analysis in Business Writing

Audience Analysis Overview - Purdue OWL
Tips for gathering information about your intended audience, their needs, and expectations
Adapting to Your Audience - Colorado State University
This guide provides an overview of audience types, audience analysis, and writing for an audience

Revision in Business Writing

Revision in Business Writing - Purdue OWL
Provides an overview on revising business documents
Revising for Clarity - Purdue OWL
This guide provides targeted questions to help you revise for concision and clarity
Tailoring Language to Your Audience - Purdue OWL
This guide provides targeted questions to help you revise your language and message
Organization and Correctness - Purdue OWL
This guide provides an overview fitting the form to your message and audience
Proofreading - Purdue OWL
A general overview of proofreading strategies