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Dear Investment Writing subscriber

Happy October! Normally, my husband and I would be thinking about buying Halloween candy. But the CDC is encouraging alternative Halloween activities this year. For more ideas, here are some Halloween tips from infectious disease experts, published in Good Housekeeping magazine.

Diversity-friendly writing
I discovered the Diversity Style Guide, a free online resource, when I was researching whether I should capitalize the w in “white” if I capitalize the b in “black.” This is an alphabetical guide to terms related to all aspects of diversity. It also includes topic glossaries for age/generation, disability, drug and alcohol, geography, immigration, LGBTQ, race/ethnicity, and religion. The guide was started by the Center for Integration and Improvement of Journalism at San Francisco State University.

Speaking of diversity, Sonya Dreizler has an excellent piece on Morningstar about “What I've Learned From Talking With White Advisors About Race.” Also, the Federal Reserve Banks of Atlanta, Boston, and Minneapolis will kick off a series of presentations about "Racism and the Economy" on October 7.

Out and About Q&A
I’m interviewed about my career and diversity in financial services on the Out & About blog. As I say there,
The world’s best ideas don’t mean anything if you can’t move people to act on them.
Attending a virtual conference?
I share tips for “How to get the most out of a virtual conference” in my September column for the NAPFA Advisor, the monthly magazine that I edit. My production coordinator liked my column so much, she asked to share my column with another association holding its first online conference.

I’m attending NAPFA’s all-virtual fall conference. NAPFA will hold live online sessions Oct. 21-23, along with on-demand sessions Oct. 12-23.

Recent topics 
During the past month I’ve blogged about filtering out bad information, creating better headlines, narrowing your focus, and Mistake Monday. You can read the start of my post about The Cloze test for readability below.
 
Best wishes,
Susan

Too much financial content is hard to understand. It uses technical vocabulary. It’s too wordy. It’s poorly organized. But sometimes it’s hard for authors to tell when content doesn’t work. What can they do?

I learned about the Cloze test from reading “Tips and Tools for Consumer Friendly Disclosure” by University of Georgia’s Professor Brenda J. Cude, a National Association of Insurance Commissioners consumer representative. It works as explained in her slide below:
Let’s experiment to see if the test works.
Disclosure: If you click on an Amazon link in this post and then buy something, I will receive a small commission. I provide links to books only when I believe they have value for my readers.

Looking for more practical tips for your marketing and writing? Visit my blog to read my latest posts!
“Susan's book thoroughly addresses everything a blogger needs to know, from compliance and SEO to promoting a blog and hiring a ghost blogger. My surprise was how helpful her writing tips were to me, a writer of more than 20 years in the financial services industry.”

Photo Credit: Dave Dugdale via Compfight cc 

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