I’ve found myself writing a fair number of professional bio’s
recently, so I decided to take a few minutes to put fingers to keyboard to whip
up a quick how-to on writing an effective biography. Bio’s can be used in a number of places
including your company website, sales literature, or a program at a conference you’re
speaking or presenting at and provide a summary overview of one in all of their
glory.
What Is a Bio?
While it’s a pretty straightforward question, it’s worth pausing
for a moment to consider. Of course, bio
is short for biography which is a written account of a series of events that
make up a person’s life. However, bio’s
come in different shapes and sizes.
Twitter provides the shortest bio opportunity, limiting you to 140
characters. The “Summary” section of
your LinkedIn profile is a bio and is usually a few paragraphs long. If you have a blog, your bio is probably a
few paragraphs there, too. Many
companies include bio’s for their ownership and management team members on
their ‘About’ or ‘Company Profile’ pages on their website. Famous people often have biographies that are published books and can
span several hundred pages.
What Does a Bio Include?
A bio is a summary of you as a person and what it includes
depends on where it will appear. Professional
bio’s are the most common type—the sort that appears on sales literature,
websites, and on other business related channels. Typically, a professional bio highlights your
related professional experience, your academic background, and career
achievements. Awards, published articles
and high profile customers or projects are all fair game for a professional
bio.
Non-professional bio’s might relate to charitable work or
community involvement and typically include more personal information such as how
long you’ve been married, how many children you have and what your hobbies
include.
It’s also not a bad idea to, where space allows, include
some personal information in a professional bio: it will help put a human touch
to your professional profile.
How To Write a Bio
Bio’s aren’t that difficult to write because of the law of
supply and demand: most people generally have a lot to say about themselves but
the amount of space or words they have to work with is typically limited. The challenge in writing a bio is cherry
picking the important details and piecing them together in one continuous piece. If you’re writing a professional bio a good
place to start is with a resume: reduce it to its essence by continually removing
the least relevant information until you’re within whatever space constraints you’re
working with. Then turn what’s left into
a well written piece.
When you’re writing a bio, even if it’s your own, always
write in the third person. Don’t write
“I am the Managing Partner of Fering Communications Inc. I am married and have three children.”,
instead write “Steve Hartley is the Managing Partner of Fering Communications
Inc. He is married and has three children”.
Consider your tone carefully: let how the bio will be used
dictate the formality of the tone. A
professional bio should be written in a formal tone even if you’re a
joke-a-minute kinda person—you never know how a reader might interpret some tongue-in-cheek
humour.
Adding a picture is always a good idea as it literally puts
a face with a name and that builds a stronger relationship with the
reader. Again, let the purpose dictate
the picture: a smiling but serious picture would be suitable for a professional
bio, a picture of you with your family for more personally oriented purposes,
and a picture of you with your beer league hockey buddies for something more
fun.
Conclusion
Biographies are everywhere you look, and writing one can be
a bit tricky. If you keep the purpose of
the bio in mind and make sure what is included is relevant to the purpose,
you’re on the right track. Letting the
purpose of the bio dictate the tone and writing in the third person will also
help make sure that the bio is appropriate.
Adding a picture adds a personal touch that will connect with the reader.
Got
something to say? Leave a comment below, we’d love to hear from you! Got a
question that we can address in our blog? Contact us through our website or email me directly and we’ll put our
crack team to work and let you know when we post a reply.
Other Blog Posts
If you
liked this blog post, here are some other blog posts that you might also like:
Steve Hartley,
Managing Partner
Fering
Communications Inc.
Website: www.feringcommunications.com
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