Even if business writing is not your area of expertise, you can learn how to write clear and accurate information. Listed below are ten suggestions that will help you improve your writing skills.

1. Define your reason for writing the material.

Ask yourself what you hope to accomplish by writing the material.  We generally write to inform, explain, persuade, instruct, entertain, or document.  Once you know exactly why you are writing the material, you can develop your ideas and gather the information needed to write it.

2. Know your audience or target market.

Before you start writing, find out as much information about your target audience as possible. What are their ages, occupations, gender, interests, needs, and desires? How knowledgeable are they about the subject?
This information will help you write materials that your audience can relate to and motivate them to take the desired action.

3. Write your materials from the audience's or target market's perspective.

If you want to grab and hold the attention of your audience, you must let them know what benefit they will gain from reading your materials. Will they have the opportunity to buy a product that will make their lives easier? Will they save money by using your service? Will they be better informed about a topic of importance to them? Your message must speak to the needs and aspirations of your target audience.

4. Write clear and straightforward sentences.

Avoid wordy sentences that cloud your message. Long sentences can confuse and distract readers.

5. Keep your paragraphs under eight lines.

Long blocks of text can be perceived as time consuming to read. Readers may have little time to devote to reading your material. Any perception that reading your material will be "drudgery" will turn them off. Therefore, short paragraphs that read fast and flow well will hold readers' attention.

6. Guide readers through the document.

By using headings, subheadings, and white space, you can visually guide readers through your document. Headings and subheadings give readers valuable information at a glance. They can be used to transition from one topic to the next and connect information. They enable readers to focus on information that is of greatest importance or interest to them. White space breaks up text and makes it easier to read.

7. Use bold, underline, italic, and other font attributes sparingly.

The use of special typefaces such as bold or italic is a great way to grab readers' attention and emphasize important information. However, if used too much, these special attributes lose their impact and make text more difficult to read.

8. Ask someone to read what you have written.

Enlist the help of a friend, relative, colleague, employee, or someone else capable of providing constructive criticism to read what you have written.  Explain the purpose of the information and ask them to read it as if they were a member of the target audience.  Then, ask them a few key questions like the following:

a. Does the information make sense?
b. Is any important information missing?
c. Did you find any misspelled words, punctuation errors, or problems with the format?
d. Would you change anything?

9. Put the material aside for a few days and then review it for clarity and accuracy.

A sure way to catch errors, inconsistencies, and formatting problems is to give yourself a break from reviewing the material.  By putting it aside, you will clear your mind and be able to re-read the document with a fresh set of eyes.

10. Arm yourself with a few good reference guides. 

Dictionaries, thesauruses, grammar handbooks, and style manuals will help you with word usage, sentence structure, and punctuation.

The primary reason for creating written communication is to connect you to your target audience and get them to take the desired action.  If you are not in a position to hire a professional writer and have the time, you can write your own materials.