Email and business letters should be written to turn on colleagues, customers and suppliers rather than turn them off. How often do you receive emails from colleagues, suppliers and customers with first sentences like this (real examples some from big recognised companies, just the business names withheld):
- We specialise in the field of manufacturing of industrial generators, supplying a wide variety of UPS solutions as well as industrial renewable energy solutions.
- This online training course will utilize a variety of proven online learning techniques to ensure maximum understanding, comprehension, retention of the information presented.
- If you haven’t had time to poke around the content on our blog and social media, you might have missed out on a little series we call What’s the Score.
- A pandemic of this magnitude is likely to lead to feelings of fear, anger, anxiety and confusion. But when we expect things to get better soon, we lose energy and hope when the situation doesn’t change quickly enough.
- In any commercial kitchen Stainless Steel Tables and Sinks are a must!
- Our 4% offer is promotional and fixed for duration of the loan amount you wish to take up with us.
- In an ever-changing world where “normal” is redefined, (ABC car tyre company) is challenging expectations to bring you the best in service excellence, delivered straight to your door!
- I think we can all agree that 2019 was challenging for us and I know 2020 is going to be no different.
- Kindly have a look and see if it’s something worth attending for you and your team.
The opening sentence of your email or business letter is important because it will determine whether it gets read.
More importantly, business people must write with an objective to get things done or seek agreement to decisions.
Your opening sentence can result in your email or business letter being ignored, filed away or worst of all simply deleted.
In these economic times and with communication at digital speed, can you afford to carry on in the same old way, trotting out well worn openings that put your readers to sleep or leave them frustrated?
You know how hard it is to get attention with your emails and writing the wrong thing can upset colleagues and customers? I teach business people to write with confidence and less frustration through quick practical tips and examples from my years of business experience.
Agreed. If the opening doesn’t pique my attention, I don’t read further. Moreover, if the email contains errors- spelling or grammatical or misspelling of my name, on principal I ignore the pitch.
As an aside, if the place is offering a special, it needs to be revealed clearly and concisely. I’m not interested in phoning to hear about specials but I will phone if the special detailed is of interest to me.
Thank you very much for your comment. I appreciate it immensely. You’re quite right about openings. Your remarks about special offers is instructive. I am posting these short articles as teasers for an online writing course I am developing with six lessons that I hope to offer sometime soon. I have two more lessons to develop. If you know of anyone who wishes to improve their business writing, I would be most grateful to hear from them. The online course would be very reasonably priced. If someone needs a helping hand in life and business, I could get them to do the course at no charge. They would just have to write me a honest motivation.