Writing Effective Business Letters

The advantages and disadvantages of writing

What is the purpose of letter writing? Why must we do it?

A written document can provide more than a visit or phone call. It not only gets your message across clearly but it provides a permanent record. With well-written letters there should be no misunderstanding, unlike the possibility on the telephone or in conversation.

Letters also serve as a record. They are long-lasting, tangible evidence of information you communicate to others.

Writing has its advantages and disadvantages.

Advantages

• You can choose your words carefully
• You can send the same message to several people
• The risk of misunderstanding is less than speech
• It is a permanent record, which you can copy and refer to later.

Disadvantages

• It takes time
• It does not have the advantages of body language, which can emphasise points and motivate
• You cannot be certain people have read the document
• You get no immediate feedback, hence you cannot modify the message if readers misunderstand it.

As a general rule

• If all you want to do is communicate factual information - writing is best
• If you want to persuade, motivate and involve - verbal communication is better.

When considering whether to write or speak to someone, ask yourself these questions:

1. ‘Would it be best to put this in writing?'
2. ‘Should I use writing to back up my words?'
3. ‘Will I save a lot more time and trouble later, if I take the time and trouble to put it into writing now?'

Before you begin writing a business letter ask yourself:

Who will read it? Who am I writing this to?

Why am I writing this letter - what had led up to it?

What do I hope to get out of it (my maximum aims)?

What do you expect to get out of it (my realistic aims)?

What information do I need to provide? For example, dates of previous letters, dates you saw advertisement, dates of appointments, addresses of shops and people, names of people involved, reference or account numbers.

What convincing points do I need to use?

When was it written? (Is there a delay in replying)

How will it be received by the reader? (Look at it from another perspective)

What is the purpose of the letter?

When you write a business letter, you must try not to waste your reader's time. The first step in any writing task is to set down your aim. Ask yourself, Why am I writing? and What do I want to achieve? The clearer you are in your own mind about what you want to achieve, the better your letter.

You need to make a clear decision about the purpose of the document before you start to write. Are you writing to:

• provide information?
• get some action?
• give instructions?
• change opinions, persuade or sell an idea?
• confirm an agreement made face-to-face or over the telephone?

What do you want the writing to achieve? How you organise your ideas will depend on this.

These questions help you focus on the information that supports your central aim, and to cut information that is irrelevant. By doing this, you'll find you keep to the subject and perhaps write a document that is a third shorter than you would otherwise draft. 

Tailoring writing for your audience

Who will read it?

A basic lesson that all authors must face is: ‘What market are they writing for?' Authors who write successful thrillers do not do it by accident. They know who reads their books, what their readers' expectations are, the level of language they understand and the situations they like to read about.

Even if the reader is likely to be a well-educated person, the readability level needs to be simple enough for anyone to read it.

Clarity and emphasis

• It is important to remember that fonts and font size must be clear and large enough to read
• Colour can be effective. Many documents are fine in just black and white, but some, especially forms, are much clearer with a second colour. However, use colour to achieve a purpose, not just to look pretty
• Colour can be used for headings, outlines of boxes, as a pale tint background and so on. Always make sure there is enough contrast between the background and the type, because many people have difficulty picking out things like grey on blue paper
• If you wish to emphasise something use bold. For headings, use bold, larger type, colour (if you have it) or a mixture of the three
• DO NOT USE LONG STRINGS OF CAPITALS. Because they are all the same height they are much more difficult to read than lower-case letters.

Making writing easy to read

When we write for other people, it is essential that is easy for them to read. If they cannot read what we write, or cannot be sure of what we mean, then we may not achieve the result we want.

So how can we make our written communications work?

Obviously, the first step is to make sure our writing is easy to read and understand. To achieve this we need:

• Accuracy
• Brevity
• Clarity.

Accuracy means:

• getting the facts right
• getting the grammar and spelling right.

Brevity means:

• sticking to the point
• not using more words than you need to.

Clarity means:

• expressing yourself simply and clearly
• using a logical structure.

Remember that writing can go on the record for a long-time. If you have made a silly factual mistake, it will not be easy to get rid of it.

Grammar and spelling are also important. If you write with inaccurate spelling or grammar, someone will notice and this will affect the way they see you.

Here are some more examples of sentences containing long-winded phrases you can replace with clearer ones. Jot down what you think would be a better word to use in each of these sentences instead of the group of words highlighted.

1. Despite the fact that deliveries of raw materials were late, the order was met on time.
   
   
2. This in many cases proved to be so.
   
   
3. I should like to draw your attention to the fact that I haven't been paid.
   
   
4. We must give due consideration to the staff development programme.
   
   
5. In view of the fact that I am retiring this year, I am of the opinion that somebody else should undertake the long-term project.
   
   
6. All departments, with the exception of Data Processing, were represented.

There are generally seven stages of letter writing:

The heading of a letter should include the name of your company, the address, telephone number, facsimile number and e-mail address.

It is not necessary to type the return address if you are using stationery with the return address already imprinted.

2.  The Inside Address
This is the address you are sending your letter to (also called the addressee). Make it as complete as possible. Include titles and names if you know them.

This is always on the left margin. If an A4 paper is folded in thirds to fit in a standard business envelope, the inside address can appear through the window in the envelope.

An inside address also helps the recipient route the letter properly and can help should the envelope be damaged and the address become unreadable.

Display the town/ city in capitals (or country if abroad), this assists the post office.

The inside address goes one blank line after the heading (this may be different if you use envelopes with a window, to ensure their address fits in the window).

3. Date Line
The date line should be typed one blank line after the inside address. Type it in full, for example: 22 March 2004. If you use 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th. etc make sure you use this style throughout the whole letter. It is best practice not to use the st, nd, rd, th, etc in letters.

4.  The Greeting (also called the salutation)
The greeting in a business letter is always formal. It normally begins with the word "Dear" and either includes the person's first or last name.

If your policy is to match the customer's style and the customer signs of as Sarah, respond with Dear Sarah. Use a first name only if the title is unclear - for example, you are writing to someone named "Chris" but do not know whether the person is male or female.

It is best practice not to include a comma at the end of the greeting, e.g. use "Dear Mr Smith" not "Dear Mr Smith,".

If you do not know the addressee's name, use "Dear Sir or Madam".

5.  The Body
The body of the letter is where you discuss the purpose of the letter. It is usual to start with these phrases

• "Thank you for your letter dated 21 June 2004."
• "Thank you for your letter dated 21 June 2004, addressed to [Y]. He/ she asked me to reply on his/ her behalf."
• When the letter is not dated: "Thank you for your recent letter." Or "Thank you for your letter received on [Z]."
• Emails: Include the date received.
• Postal strike: Include date received.

Only apologise for a delayed response if it took an unacceptable amount of time to respond, e.g. over one week for letters and one day for emails.

Insert a blank line between the greeting and the body and insert a blank line between the body and the close.

6.  The Complimentary Close
The complimentary close is a short courtesy signal at the end of each letter.

Insert a blank line between the body and the complementary close.

If you are writing to someone whose name and title you do not know, match the greeting "Dear Sir or Madam" with the ending "Yours faithfully".

If you are writing to a named person, address them as "Dear Mr/Mrs/Miss/Ms ...", and end "Yours sincerely". Do not use punctuation. Four lines down, include your first name and surname. On the next line, include your role.

If you have met them or spoke to them by phone, or otherwise feel that you have some acquaintance with them, address them by their first name and sign yourself Yours sincerely, using your first name.

7.  The Signature Line
Leave enough space to type out the name to be signed. Women may indicate how they wish to be addressed by placing Miss, Mrs., Ms. or similar title in parentheses before their name.

You may include your position in the organisation on the next line.

The above information are examples from the workbook we issue on our letter writing courses. You can download other pages of the workbook from our website or contact us for more information.