A Writer’s Guide To Powerful Paragraphs

Book & Product Reviews

Yes. I am working through the summer. Although working from home does have its advantages.

• Regular reading breaks in the sun…every afternoon.

So this is the start of a new series of book reviews for as long as the sunny weather lasts.

My criteria for choosing what to read is based on:

• Quick afternoon reads – short and easy to read
• Useful for creating an international web business

Here is the first book I read. And it is a gem.

• A Writer’s Guide To Powerful Paragraphs by Victor C. Pellegrino

This book surprised me. So much in fact that I have been trying to remember who recommended it to me.

You see, this book is one of three books by Victor Pellegrino. I bought them as used books on Amazon, so they came in at different times. The first one to arrive was:

• A Writer’s Guide To Using 8 Methods Of Transition

This is a slim book. Easy to follow examples. I couldn’t wait to read the other two books.
The book, A Writer’s Guide To Powerful Paragraphs, came in yesterday. And yes, it is about writing paragraphs.

Light bulbs started going off in my brain as I read this. This is why I wish I could remember who recommended it – he knew about the light bulbs.

What I loved most about this book, is it is great to use as a guideline for writing web pages.

Yes, web pages.

Why? Well…

• Web pages need to stay focused on one subject. So do paragraphs.
• Web pages need to be written for one specific audience. So do paragraphs.
• Web pages need to be written in a logical order. So do paragraphs.

And this book makes it all very easy. Victor Pellegrino teaches you with examples. He is a good writer. So learning is fast.

This is a fantastic primer for web copywriting. It is not the only book you should read on web copywriting. But it does teach you how to stay focused on one subject. You can easily pick one of the 30 different paragraphs and adapt it to one web page.

Just like in web copywriting, this book remains totally focused on your audience. You learn how to speak to your reader’s needs at that particular moment…in a particular paragraph. This is vital in web copywriting.

After a brief outline on how to write paragraphs, the main substance of the book is on 30 different types of paragraphs.

Yes, these are normal length paragraphs. Standard web writing uses shorter “paragraphs”. The 30 different examples show you how to structure one paragraph for one subject based on the reason for writing your paragraph.

Victor Pellegrino writes well. This book is very easy to understand. Perfect for a quick read. It has inspired me to do a series of 30 different paragraphs as short blog posts.

Oh, and the third book in the series…? It came in the mail today.

• A Writer’s Guide To Transitional Words And Expressions

This is another gem I will keep next to me. It is a very slim book. It is a mini-thesaurus on transitional words. I have been battling with the word “but” for a few weeks. Its just seems to crop up too often. Hopefully this little book will help me get out of this habit quickly.

The book only took me a couple of hours to read. I enjoyed it and found it inspiring.
Watch out for some short blog “paragraph” articles soon…about 30 of them.

Read more Book Reviews:

Communication For International Sales

Here are reviews of the books I have read recently to help me with communication for international sales:

• A Writer’s Guide To Powerful Paragraphs By Victor C. Pellegrino
• Content Rich By Jon Wuebben
• Get Content Get Customers by Joe Pulizzi & Newt Barrett
• Letting Go Of The Words – Writing Web Content That Works By Janice Redish
• Stories That Sell By Casey Hibbard
• The Culturally Customized Web Site By Nitish Singh And Arun Pereira
• The Magic Of Pre-Writing By Steven Osborne
• The Secret To Writing A Successful And Outstanding Blog By Liz Strauss

International Sales

Here are reviews of the books I have read recently to help me with international sales:

• All of the Little Sales Books by Jeffrey Gitomer
• Asinine Advertising By Herschell Gordon Lewis
• Influencer: The Power To Change Anything by Kerry Patterson – Joseph Grenny – David Maxfield – Ron McMillian & Al Switzler
• Sales Strategy From The Inside Out By Duane Sparks

International Web Marketing

Here are reviews of the books I have read recently to help me with international web marketing:

• Bit Literacy Productivity in the Age of Information and E-mail Overload By Mark Hurst
• Dotcomology The Science Of Making Money Online By Stone Evans
• How The Internet Works By Preston Gralla
• How to Win Sales & Influence Spiders By Catherine Seda
• Landing Page Optimization By Tim Ash
• Mastering Online Marketing By Mitch Meyerson
• Multichannel Marketing By Akin Arikan
• Online Competitive Intelligence By Helen P. Burwell
• ProBlogger by Darren Rowse and Chris Garrett
• Stats Faceslap By Ed Rivis
• The Ultimate Web Marketing Strategy By Ed Rivis
• Website Optimization by Andrew B. King

Here are some Product Reviews:

• Ed Rivis’ Stats Faceslap
• Success Chef’s Marketing E.S.P.
• The Management Tools I Use For Content Created To Be Re-Packaged
• The Ultimate Desktop Copy Coach By Tony Flores
  
• Web Video University And International Marketing
  

All of the book and product reviews here are totally unsolicited… spontaneous …and without affiliate links. These are books I have read recently and only the ones that I share with friends. So all of the reviews you find here are on books and products that I highly recommend.

Also, as these are books and products that I have recently read since, this is not a list of my all-time favorite books. Hopefully I will get around to reviewing my favorite culture and international business books sometime soon.

Use these skills in your international tactics on the…
Get International Clients International Sales Road Map:

Guide To Multichannel Marketing • Do you know how to communicate with different countries? This guide shows you how

Guide To International Web Marketing • Do you know how to pull all of your different international marketing pieces together? This guide shows you how

Step 5 – Connect With Your International Markets Connect… • With culture customized content • With trust and empathy • With strong cross-cultural communication

International Business Success Basics • Do you feel at a loss with regards to dealing with international business? This guide gives you the background information you need right from the start.

Tagged as: Summer Book Review, web copywriting

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