Press Releases
Working with dynamic brand ambassadors like NASCAR XFinity driver Jeffrey Earnhardt gave me opportunities to write press releases like this one, for Dalstrong.
Blogs
In the past two years I have had the great fortune to work with some incredible brand ambassadors, content creators, and “doers.” My interviews with them are documented on the Dalstrong spotlight page.
For over seven years my day job was with the Government of British Columbia, so my writing projects for them are mostly uncredited, but there are a few good blogs like this one.
I’ve also written blogs for my website Citijal.ca, which you can find here: https://citijal.ca/home/blog/
Books
I’ve written what I think is a really great rhyming children’s book designed to help families share both English and French with their children, but I haven’t gotten around to publishing it yet… Maybe soon?
How can someone who doesn’t speak French help their child to learn the language? How can Francophone parents help their children learn English? Say Parfait is inspired by my personal struggles as an Anglophone in pursuit of a French degree. Growing up on the west coast of BC, I had limited access to the French language, and at first I struggled with pronunciation and spelling. Say Parfait is designed to help overcome these initial difficulties for budding linguists; it brings together words that rhyme in English and in French to help teach pronunciation of both languages. The rhyming couplets make repetition fun, and help to create word associations that cross the language barrier. The new vocabulary must be read, said, and seen to be understood.
Web Copy
I mean, you really gotta see it to believe it, but I have created a lot of web content. Here’s the link to the latest and greatest: https://citijal.ca/
Although WordPress is my favourite platform and the one I am most proficient in, I have also used Kentico, Drupal, Adobe Dreamweaver and CMS Lite. The skillset to move across these platforms is pretty transferrable and my curiosity makes it easy to learn and explore new platforms.
Software
I use a variety of platforms for my writing, but my mainstay is the Microsoft Office suite, especially Word, of course. I also like to take notes in OneNote, and when I am writing in French I love some of the grammar and spelling tools available online – my favourite is BonPatron.
I actually don’t use things like Gammarly, although I have played with some of them, because I am pretty familiar with the Associated Press style and can mostly rattle that off without any trouble.
For blogs, I like WordPress (obviously) and for storyboarding video scripts I actually like to use PowerPoint so I can shuffle the slides around to restructure the story as needed.
Interested in building, updating or improving your website? Let’s connect!
Abby W. Pollen 