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The Importance of Being Earnest

When writing a business letter, remember that to your reader, your letter is you. In addition to conveying your literal message your letter speaks with your voice and carries your intonations. Here are five ways to convey your sincerity to your reader:

1. Open the letter with a friendly comment.

“Everybody talks about the weather but nobody does anything about it,” said some pundit. Fortunately, you do not have to do anything about the weather if you want to use it as an icebreaker in your letter. “Hope the weather has not been too hot in Dallas,” or “I hope you are enjoying the first snow the season,” are innocuous openings to a business letter. They don’t win prizes for originality, but the idea is to get the letter off to a friendly start.

If you can’t bring yourself to mention the weather, then refer to a conversation that you have had recently with this person. You can write “It was good to talk with you recently.” You don’t have to write that it was great to talk to them. Maybe it was not great to talk to the person but it must not have been so terrible or you wouldn’t be writing to him now. You can also write “I hope you’ve been well since our last conversation.”

2. Write in the “you” form.

Otherwise known as the second person, the “me-you” form of writing is much warmer than third-person forms. For example, writing “we will begin work as soon we receive your approval” or “we will begin work as soon as you give us your approval” is warmer than “our firm will begin work as soon as approval is received”.

3. Be polite.

Use the words please, thank you, I appreciate it, and I am sorry whenever they are appropriate in your correspondence.

4. Use a reader-friendly format.

White space draws readers into your letter. If you single-space your text, allow extra space between paragraphs. And no cheating on those margins! A 1.25” margin is good if you think the person might want to make notes in the margin of your letter. Otherwise, allow 1” all around.  Use 12-point type. You wouldn’t want your reader bumping his nose on your letter just because you used 9-point type.

5. Close with a cordial remark.

People remember the last thing they read. This means that you must restate any important requests or promises in the closing paragraph of your letter. After that, remind the person what a pleasure it is to do business, how much you look forward to a continued relationship, etc. You can write yours truly, sincerely, or, if you’re from California, big hug. Again, there are no prizes for originality in these phrases. Just be polite and friendly.

In short, project yourself as a sincere and courteous correspondent and your readers will want to know more about you and your business.

About the Author:

Elizabeth Danziger offers customized on-site writing training to business people throughout the United States. She also writes and edits a wide range of business documents including web copy, blogs, marketing material and core business correspondence. She can be reached at lizd@worktalk.com or at (310) 396-8303 (California).

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com – The Importance of Being Earnest in Business Writing