How to improve

your writing style

C R A F T I N G YO U R W O R D S I N A WAY T H AT T O U C H E S P E O P L E
Here’s Oana
from Pixelgrade
I am super happy I have the chance to share with you some of the best
writing tips we mentioned in the past three years on our blog. I gen-
uinely believe in the power of storytelling as a way of growing, under-
standing and changing things for the better.

In the end, we’re more alike than different, so through great stories, we
can create solid bridges that help us navigate through the challenging
ocean of information.

In this eBook, we put together some of our best articles regarding how
to write better on your blog with everything it implies: from finding
your voice to how you can express emotions through your writing. We
improved some of them while bringing others on board so that you,
the reader, get more value.

What you are going to read is not a blueprint. It’s a curated collection
of our best advice on how to write in a way that touches people.

Ready to get some inspiration? Grab your favorite drink and let’s go.
How to express
your ideas in writing

In this first chapter, you will learn how to put ideas in writ-
ing in a way that fits your values and personality. People can
steal ideas, even pieces of content (grrr!), but nobody can
take what is it that makes you, you. Read onward on how to
achieve this level, and master it on your blog.
How to express your
ideas in writing
We live in a world where the importance of written
communication has increased dramatically.

We heavily rely on technology and digital contact. From the way we

keep in touch with the dear ones, to how we approach the people we
admire — we often use tools where writing is king. To make sure we
achieve our goals through written communication, we first need to
learn how to handle it.

I’ve been wearing the communication and storytelling hat on a daily

basis for more than 7 years. I’ve been active in this field since I came
to college, and ever since I tried to keep track with the changes and
the dynamic of this world from multiple varied roles: freelancer, volun-
teer, marketer, community builder and so on.

Along the way, I’ve had a hard time finding reliable solutions regard-
ing how I could improve my writing skills. Therefore, I want to enable
you to enjoy a more accessible entry-point, and walk you through the
basics of written communication within the digital environment. What
follows is not a blueprint, so feel free to take whatever fits you and
question the rest. Let’s get started!

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Why do we write?

It may sound naive, but we can easily take writing for

granted. This activity is so integrated into our daily lives,
that we no longer question why we write and prefer this way
of communication instead of others, and what we want to
accomplish.

There are tons of reasons why we write: from the functional ones, to
the emotional arguments. All carry their weight. However, there are a
few personal advantages why writing matters:

CLARITY
Putting everything on paper helps you draw a clearer picture of your
thoughts. When you can observe what you wrote, it’s easier to find the
red thread, as well as the flaws and inconsistencies in your ideas. You
can take notes, underline repetitive snippets, and have a clear picture
of your work.

C O M M U N I C AT I O N
Sharing the particular way you see the world and how youo refer to
it weights a lot. Expressing your ideas helps you have an impact on
the world, and change it for the better. Your unique point of view can
attract people who share the same core values and want to join your
tribe.

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I M PA C T
Your bold and courageous ideas can become the drive in other peo-
ple’s lives. Show them different angles, perspectives, and move folks
around the world towards a meaningful goal. Your words can capture
attention and interest, and coalesce a disparate public of random peo-
ple into a community of followers. people into followers.

FREEDOM
Writing is an act of freedom, where you can showcase the real you,
without strings attached. Exploring the world through writing can
impact not only the way you’re thinking, but also the way you’re under-
standing what’s happening around you.

People have been using this form of communication since the dawn
of civilization, making sure ideas remain etched in time, outliving their
authors and speaking to keen minds across the ages. And they have
constantly adjusted to the transformations that have taken place
along the way. From sending a letter from the fronts of war, to writing a
pre-defined SMS. The need to convey ourselves through writing re-
sides deeply within us, and only becomes even stronger in time.

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How do we write?

I typed this question on Google, and 1,820,000,000 results

popped up. It’s crazy to observe how much information is
available out there.

The irony is that almost everyone out there has a magic solution to
share, a tip to take into consideration, a recipe to follow. Given their
appropriate contexts, all sources are somehow relevant, and can be
useful to a degree. However, there’s a thin line between what you need
to know to become better with written communication, and everything
that’s out there.

You should trust your skills and shape your particular way of writing.
Practice makes perfect, as they say, and it’s definitely true. But they
forget to mention that starting is the first step. Once you kick-off and
develop a writing habit, you will craft your skills and become a better
writer everyday.

In my experience, as a blogger, then a professional copywriter, and

now an active storyteller, I dare to suggest for you a few writing styles
you could experiment with:

W R I T E T H E W AY Y O U TA L K
Write for one reader, not for an entire audience. Make it personal and
meaningful, by expressing your ideas as you would in front of one
friend, not a bunch of unknown people. Create an emotional connec-
tion with the reader, and guide him through the story as a good old pal.

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WRITE WITH RESPONSABILITY
Be true to yourself, and let people know about your experience, not
other folks’ learnings. Own it. No matter if you’re in your 20s, be brave
to write about how you feel. Often, it’s far more important than a bunch
of big lessons learned. On top of that, you are not alone in this game
and similar people will definitely resonate with you.

W R I T E F O R YO U R S E L F F I R S T
Express your personality and way of thinking through your writing. You
are the first who reads that piece of content, so make sure it resonates
with your inner-why. Be authentic, and put yourself out there. Don’t try
to imitate others, or copycat recipes, because they will bring you to a
dead end.

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What do we write?

It is often said that there’s an answer for everything out

there, so there’s not much left to cover.

My belief is actually somewhere at the opposite side of the spectrum.

Even though it’s true that we are exposed to a an overload of informa-
tion, it doesn’t mean that nuances are not important. In fact, we live in
a world where we deeply need them. Here are a few options you can
choose from, in order to pack a story in style:

PERSONAL STORIES
Share what makes you-you. Experiences, wins, failures, mistakes,
beliefs, anything that says something meaningful about the person
behind the scenes.

COMMON TOPICS WITH A TWIST

Give people a different perspective on a particular topic, and help
them change their day-to-day lens. Invest time and energy to repack
everything to suit your style.

B O L D S TAT E M E N T S
Showcase the values you stand for by writing opinionated articles.
Boldly express your personality and make room for people to let you
know if they echo your approach or not.

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How do I start writing?

First of all, good writing means good reading.

There’s no other way around.

People who don’t read a lot have a tough time writing well. It’s the
same principle that applies to other forms of creative work as well.
Take photographers, for instance. Good photographers travel, meet
people in person, are active folks who have a deeper understanding of
how the world works.

A simple yet effective way to put the above advice in practice is to do

the following exercise:

1 . C H O O S E A T O P I C T H AT Y O U ’ R E I N T E R E S T E D I N
It can be anything as long as you manifest excitement and a dose of
genuine curiosity.

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2 . W R I T E A O N E - PA R A G R A P H S T Y L E A R T I C L E
A B O U T YO U R I D E A
This way you have a simple summary at your fingertips, and you can
easily keep track with during the process.

3 . D E F I N E A C L E A R S T R U CT U R E TO H E L P YO U
KEEP THE RED THREAD
• intro (the central idea that you will explore in the article);
• main sections (headings);
• conclusion (an insight you hope people will react to or sleep on).

4. WRITE A ROUGH FIRST DRAFT

Don’t take it too seriously. Play with it, and just throw in all the
thoughts you have in mind related to the topic.

5. GO IN-DEPTH
Take each section, and write down the ideas and arguments that fit
that particular area.

6 . E D I T W I T H O U T M E R C Y W H AT Y O U H AV E W R I T-
T N E , A N D TA K E O U T A L L T H E G A R B A G E
Read it out loud and see if it makes sense if you can cut some
sidenotes, or maybe you can rephrase ideas and make them easier to
grasp.

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7. A S K F O R A S E C O N D O P I N I O N
Share your work with close friends or family, and ask them what made
it memorable, if it touched them and how, and what was hard to
understand or follow.

8. EDIT AGAIN
Integrate the feedback you received in the best possible way.

9. PUBLISH
Celebrate the fact that you made a dent in the Universe.

Writing is an excellent way of expressing your unique personality, and

a crucial skill you want to master. On top of that, it’s a feeling of free-
dom hard to beat by other forms of communication.

You can always explore new perspectives, and discover a new world
through writing. It’s not a matter of how many words you use, it’s how
you craft them to touch people’s hearts, as Seth Godin reminds us:

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How to capture
emotions by writing
the way you’re talking

In this second part, you learn how to craft words in a way

that makes people attach feelings to the articles. Once you
make them feel in a certain way, you know that you switched
a bunch of random folks into a tribe. Your tribe.
Capture emotions by writing
the way you’re talking
Writing is such an intimate act of creation. It’s a great way to
express your personality, and translate your values and
beliefs into powerful thoughts, which ultimately move peo-
ple to action.

Thus, writing should be personal, candid, and genuine.

I know my keyboard from top to toe. I’ve been writing professionally

for more than seven years (almost daily) for a wide range of contexts
and scenarios. No matter if I was in the freelancer’s shoes, or wearing
the blogger hat on my head, I have always sought to write the way I
talk.

And yes, sometimes, I represented a brand or a company. This doesn’t

mean that I should have written superficially, or acted like a copycat.
Quite the opposite, I have done my best to empathize as much as I
could with the brand or company, and translated their personality into
words. It can be done.

You can also build and maintain your own voice and writing style. In
this article, I walk you through why it is essential to invest in this area
constantly, and how you can shape your way of writing.

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Why writing the way you’re
talking is mandatory
If you give a damn about being authentic and building
healthy relationships with your readers, then the answer to
this question is quite straightforward: you care.

And caring is a constant preoccupation which implies time,

energy, and focus.

Also, it is a robust approach to developing stronger bonds and keeping

people near you in the very long run since no relationship (digital or
non-digital) can survive and grow without such an emotional invest-
ment.

Besides that, writing the way you usually talk is crucial, because that’s
makes you you. Maybe it sounds naive and childish, but the truth is
that you can’t pretend to be someone else. Even though it may work
for a while and you can mislead some of your readers, it doesn’t last
long.

People are smart, and they can feel that you are not true to your-
self. When this happens, they are gone forever. Nobody wants to stay
around superficial folks, who are trying to be something else just for
the sake of grabbing attention and interest.

Furthermore, the reason why you need to dig deeper and achieve this
balance is that folks get in touch with you on several communication
channels. They read your blog, they follow you on social media, they
come across interviews you gave, they take a look at your newsletters,
maybe they even meet you in the offline world.

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Sooner or later, if you are not authentic, they will find the corners you
cut, and feel disappointed. You need to be you, no matter the situation,
and attract people who resonate with your inner-why, and appreciate
this clarity.

I’m highly aware that we live in a world where recipes are the new
mantra. However, there are no instructions out there about how to be
you. You just need to follow your inner whispers, live in harmony with
them, and translate everything in behaviors and attitudes.

You can’t be Seth Godin, Jocelyn K. Glei, Jason Fried, Swiss Miss,
Austin Kleon, Neil Patel, Rand Fishkin or anyone else.

They are themselves, and you are you.

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How can you start writing
the way you talk
I don’t have a framework, but I guess you can easily find an
‘‘ultimate-ebook-covering-al-kinds-of-resources’’ out there.

Take a look, if you want, but yet again, the answer is much more
nuanced and intimate then you may think, or like to believe.

What works for me every single time is to keep in mind that I only
write for one person. It’s someone I care about, with whom I would
gladly have a coffee, and chat about those particular thoughts. To tell
you the truth, that’s how I relax into writing, I fill up with good energy,
and I am able to highlight my personality in a genuine way.

Moreover, I can write the way I talk (and better, tool) when the topic
I am covering means something to me. If I’m not open to chat about
it in the offline world, or if doesn’t suit my interests, it will surely not
come in handy for putting together the puzzle pieces for a piece of
writing.

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The truth is that nothing beats the great feeling of staying true to my-
self, and knowing that there are people out there who appreciate my
style, and can relate to that.

I was more than happy to hear during a Skype call with Linda, our cus-
tomer, that she feels moved by how I communicate during our collab-
oration.

Writing like others to have success is a myth. I dare to say that it

is more than that — a lie. The first and most important condition to
achieve outstanding results is to be you from head to toe. And as a
blogger, this often means to write the way you talk and to do it with
consistency every time you share something meaningful with the
world.

I highly encourage you to shape your writing style in a way that’s in

harmony with who you are, and build from there. People will notice,
and good things will happen organically even when you least expect
them.

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 How to transmit
the human touch
in communication
c

In this last chapter, we’ll guide you through how you can
make the most out of your unique traits, and pack everything
with a human touch. This way, people will follow you in the
long run, and that ultimately amounts to growth and oppor-
tunities.
How to transmit the human
touch in communication

Showing vulnerability and being in sync with your values and

beliefs makes room for you to flourish.

Some like to think that polishing a fake, yet impressive image about
ourselves will make us successful, whatever that means for each of us.
I firmly believe that the truth is, actually, the opposite.

Working in the communication field made me quite familiar with the

pressure of finding a blue ocean. To discover a new playground to
explore. To be different, to come with something new, to constantly
innovate.

Many times along the way, I noticed that we often forget about the
basic rule of communication: craft messages that highlight your per-
sonality. This authenticity is often taken for granted; therefore we pre-
fer to imitate the big players. It’s far easier to follow recipes and mark
checkboxes, than to dive into your core and make peace with who you
are.

The first method is a shortcut, something that social media heavily

relies on today and which is trapping us there. The second approach,
though, requires process, iteration, rephrasing, dealing with uncertain-
ties. In just a word: disconfort.

In this chapter, I want to give you a few clues about how the human
touch in communication impacts your success. It’s not a marketing
tactic, nor a growth hacking strategy, and it’s first-hand advice from
my experience so far.

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Manifesting human touch
creates stronger and
healthier bonds
Currently, I’m running Skype calls with the customers who
bought the WordPress themes listed in our shop.

Even though I only had little over ten sessions so far, every person I
talked with told me about the importance of informal, friendly, and
approachable communication.

From the e-mails we send them, to how we write messages on social

media, from how we respond to their customer support tickets, to
how we communicate updates or the release of customization tools,
everything reveals a valuable feeling of trust.

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Each of these communication actions endorses the fact that they are
in good company, they are in a place where the people behind the
screens care. On top of that, we are transparent, because we mean it,
and we identify with this attitude, not because it became a hit
nowadays.

T I P : As long as you express a human touch with good intentions,v

and you genuinely care about building healthy relationships with your
customers, visitors or your tribe in general, results will pop-up.

This does not mean that all of them will be the ones you expected, but
they will have a picture about the reality you are part of.

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Expressing a human touch
gives a sense of belonging

The way you communicate can act as a catalyst. By being

warm, accessible, true-to-yourself, you increase the chances
to attract similar people.

It’s not news anymore that we are keen to stay around folks who share
same values and understanding of the world.

This happens, because it gives people a strong feeling of belonging,

far more than being invited into a private Facebook group, Slack chan-
nel or anything else. For instance, we invest time and energy in main-
taining a cordial liaison with our customers, by sending handwritten
letters and other cool goodies.

We do that not because it’s a marketing request, but mostly because

we highly appreciate our relationship, and we want to show them our
gratitude.

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Always happy to send a new
batch of handwritten letters

And yes, we want to make sure that we show them they’re

not merely an order number in an e-commerce report.

We genuinely give a damn about their struggles, we take their insights

into consideration, and we believe that they’re the best mirror of how
good we are.

T I P : The sense of belonging gives people drive, keeps them togeth-

er and acts like a uniting force. By creating this feeling, you build an
authentic tribe, interested in what you are doing, and supporting your
activities without expecting something in return.

How you translate this human touch can help you nurture powerful
connections, but the first step is to manifest vulnerability, to show
that you are open-minded, ready to leave your biases behind, and to
develop a relationship with all the ups-and-downs it implies.

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The way you express human
touch reveals your vision
about the world

There’s plenty of room for everyone out there. There’s no

doubt about that. However, at Pixelgrade, we’ve always been
huge believers in the impact we want to have.

Our aim both as a business, but also as individuals, exceeds simply

making money. Through everything we do, we seek to create a mean-
ingful legacy, and leave something worthwhile behind.

One particular action we take in this direction is to communicate in-

depth information about both our business, and the team. We publish
a Transparency Report twice a year, and share details regarding how
much money we make, how we spend them, if we brought new people
on board and so on.

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Fooling around from time
to time

The simple way of publishing this analysis says something

about our vision of the world.

We do it naturally, on our terms, in our way, mostly because we want to

give back.

T I P : How you communicate indicates the values you stand for, and
the why behind your actions. Having a human touch doesn’t necessar-
ily mean you are a loveable unicorn, and everybody out there brags
about you. This is not the purpose of embracing such an approach. It
needs to be deeply rooted in your inner-why, otherwise, it’s just a PR
shortcut that will not last much.

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How to translate a human
touch within your communi-
cation efforts?

1. BE VULNERABLE
Share facts about yourself, downsides as well, not just wins and other
glamourous moments.

2 . TA L K A N D W R I T E I N A F R I E N D LY W AY
We share similar struggles and are more alike than we are different, so
don’t be afraid to accept this.

3 . B E YO U R VO I C E
Showcase your personality as it is from head to toe; express graceful-
ness, emotion, and innocence, if this is what defines you.

4 . S H O W T H AT Y O U C A R E
This is the essence of highlighting human touch; help people see that
you give a damn beyond fulfilling your interests.

5 . B E O P I N I O N AT E D
Don’t be afraid to put yourself out there, and instead, share strong ar-
guments about the things you believe in.

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We did not choose to manifest the human touch because it
sounded like a good marketing strategy.

We did not make a SWOT diagram to see how it will serve us. We just
embraced who we are, and translated everything we’ve done in align-
ment with our essence.

It brought us here, AKA in a place where we have strong liaisons with

the people who spend their money on our WordPress themes, and
treat this dynamic as a partnership. It takes two to tango, right?

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Takeaways

1. We’re all afraid of the blank paper, no matter if it’s digital or

non-digital. The best way is to start your first draft outright. Be gentle
with yourself, it’s not the final article, but it’s far better than freezing
and doing nothing.

2. Writing the way you talk will help you create a certain mood
around your blog, and people will quickly identify it. This type of au-
thenticity will also help you keep momentum, and establish firm con-
nections with your community.

3. Choose topics that you care about and go in-depth. By put-

ting your interests into writing, and providing meaningful insights, you
attract people who share the same beliefs and this way, you will lever-
age your authority.

4. The more personal you are with your approach (by avoid-
ing general truths), the more impact you will have. If you’d like
to write about something that you think that only you struggle with,
go ahead and publish it, anyway. You’ll be surprised how many people
share the same challenges.

5. Vulnerability in writing is one of the best liaisons, because

it allows people to learn from your mistakes or failures. It’s like a gate-
way, which reinforces the human touch in communication, and that’s
priceless.

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Hasta la vista

Congrats for reading all the way to the end! This is already a great sign
that you care about your writing style, and you want to put the effort
into making it shine in the digital world. Yaaay!

As you noticed, the content of this ebook is tailored in a way that

makes you feel empowered and driven by what you can accomplish
with your stories. We chose this approach, because the Internet is al-
ready full of recipes and how-to guides of all kinds, so you can access
them with ease if this is what you need to move forward, and get trac-
tion.

From my journey I learned that people often need to hear more of the
why, instead of the how. We’re coming from different stories, and we all
aim to make a positive impact on our terms, right?