Why you have to become a better writer

I had the pleasure of interviewing Penelope Trunk last night for the forthcoming book Beyond Blogging.

She’s interesting, helpful and full of insight, and she made a major contribution to the book, and you should go and join the email list for the book when you’ve read this.

But there was one thing she said that left me lying awake last night and that kept running through my brain:

“Look at all the top blogs out there, the so called A-Listers. One thing they all have in common is the quality of the writing. Even the technical ones have extraordinary, fantastic writers.”

Of course, I’ve always been aware of that in a peripheral way, but I don’t think I’d ever really confronted the fact so directly. It scares me a little because I wonder if I’m up to the task, but it also has made me realize that those of us on a journey to the A list kingdom need to pay much more attention to that aspect of our blogs.

If you trawl through the archives here, you’ll find so much about work rate, using social media and tools of the blogging trade. But you won’t see tips and techniques to make your writing extraordinary. That’s going to change.

Help me get started. What is it that defines extraordinary writing?