AaronTurpen.com

Whether you realize it or not, business letters likely make up a large portion of your writing.  Especially if you’re a freelance writer or business owner.  Many of your emails are probably business letters, as are your proposal cover letters, your project bids, and much of your other correspondence when communicating business-to-business.

Effective business letter writing is essential to success in freelancing, especially in the service industry (such as writing).  A great business letter will have three basic elements: it will limit its scope to the objective at hand, it will clearly state its purpose at the beginning, and it will be addressed as personal correspondence between two individuals.

The first element is scope and objective.  Your objective for your business letter, whether it be a sales letter, a letter of reference, or a project proposal or bid, should be clear, concise, and stated within the first paragraph of the letter (usually the first two sentences).  If, for instance, you are writing a bid proposal for a project on a freelance website, clearly state what the bid is for and what it entails in the first paragraph of that bid.  For example:

Mr. Langley,

This bid is for eight pages of site copy, written with moderate sales pull and SEO aimed for 3 key phrases throughout.  This bid includes two revisions, at your discretion, and is for the complete job, not as a piece rate or hourly charge.

That first paragraph covers what the bid is for, what it will entail, etc.  The rest of the proposal would include details such as what constitutes a “page,” what is expected of the buyer in this case, and how communication should take place.  Any other details pertinent to the bid would be listed through the rest.  That first paragraph, though, focuses on the nitty-gritty to tell Mr. Langley what the bid is for and how much it covers.

Having been on both the buying and selling side of freelancing, I can tell you that bids that are short and to the point, but cover all the important bases, are much more likely to win compared to bids that are verbose and rambling or bids that are too technical or filled with legaleze.  Be concise, direct, and state your business right up front and you’ll find yourself better-received by those who are busy running a business and aren’t interested in wasting time reading a too-long proposal.

Whether your business letter is for a bid or to ask for assistance or something else, busy people appreciate cordial directness.  It gets the job done and doesn’t waste anyone’s time doing so.

As you can see from the example, both the scope and objective of the letter were spelled out right off and the letter began with a personal greeting (“To Whom It May Concern” doesn’t cut it in today’s information-filled world).  That covers all the required bases of a good business letter.

For a last word, I would like to give one more piece of advice: write your letters as if you were speaking to the person.  Being too clipped and professional does have a down side, so try to let your voice come through.  Stay on target with your objective and scope, but use common words and phrases rather than jargon and “five dollar words” unless it fits with what you’re writing about.

A business letter is a professional correspondence, to be sure, but it is also a personal conversation between you and whomever you’re addressing.  Try to be somewhat personable.  Also be aware that what you’ve written is permanent.  It can be printed, stored, photocopied, etc.  Bear that in mind if you’re writing demands or issuing a grievance.

There is one skill, above all others, that is the most important and vital skill every good writer needs.  For most of us, it’s also the most boring of tasks and the hardest to force ourselves to accomplish readily.  That skill is proofreading.

Proofreading (also called “proofing”) is a very necessary process and great writers (or at least steadily employed ones) are often marked by their ability to proof their own work and hand editors and publishers ready-to-print material.  These writers are, in most editor’s view, true professionals.

Here are some examples of how quality proofing can make-or-break your career – or at least your ability to get in print.

I work with an editor at a well-known online site regularly.  I submit work and she usually accepts it or asks for simple revisions (another info source, a change of wording or removal of a corporate name, etc.).  We’ve worked together for nearly a year and she’s never once returned something for grammatical revision.  After she’d approved four articles in a row without comment, I asked her if she was happy with my work.  She responded that it was top quality and I was one of the few she worked with that required little supervision in terms of staying on subject and grammar/readability.

Curious, I asked her to elaborate and she used a well-known person who occasionally writes for the same site as her example.  This person is a medical doctor and holds two PhD’s in related fields.  She said that despite this, the written pieces he submits are horrible.  “His on-target and general flow are great, but his grammar and total lack of punctuation are painful to read.  I spend a lot of time cleaning up his submissions.  If he weren’t a ‘special guest’ to the site, I would have asked that he be kicked to the curb long ago.”

In another instance, I was bidding on a job writing a handful of technical articles based on Microsoft software for someone’s website.  He’d narrowed it down to me and one other person and suggested a “write off” where we would each write one article on the same subject, he’d pay us both for that one article, but would hire the best of the two for the rest of the job.  We accepted and I submitted my article the next day.

After I’d won the job, I asked him what had won him over about my writing and he sent me the other guy’s submission and said, “Because with your stuff, I won’t have to proof read it and make sure it’s OK before I put it online.  His stuff is like this.”  I read through it and while the writing was good, the lack of punctuation and the huge paragraphs and large number of misspellings were the obvious work of someone in a hurry.

What you’ll find as a writer is that you’re more likely to have your work accepted, to win the job you’re bidding on, and to win over your editor to get the extra assignments or better payments if you are a professional.  A big part of that is making sure you’re proofreading all of your work and submitting only high-quality, top-notch stuff.  Each time, every time.

The following is a fun little Reading Test and proof primer from Udder Buffoonery:

It appears that the Udder Buffoonery website has gone the way of the Dodo.  Oh well.

I’ve had a couple of people approach me with questions about how writing for the Web differs from writing for print.  The difference boils down to one thing: how people read online versus with paper and ink in their hands.

Print publications, such as magazines and even some newspapers, often have their writers create two versions of an article: one for print, one for the Internet.  Or the editor simply pares down the print version to include it on the Web.  In either case, they’re doing it for one reason: readability.

Reading Habits Offline and On

Our reading habits when we’re sitting in a comfortable chair with a magazine in hand and a fresh beverage at our elbow are very different than those we have when sitting in an office chair looking at a computer screen.  In the comfy chair, we’ll take our time, read all of the information and absorb it slowly.  For most, this type of reading is as much for pleasure as it is for information.

When in the office chair in front of the monitor, however, our reading tends to be more about business.  Most readers of online material scan, rather than reading each word and sentence.  As with a newspaper, readers are likely to read only the first paragraph or two, hit the bullet points or otherwise highlighted text, and be done with it.

There are exceptions to this, as with anything else, of course.  Fiction and poetry are obvious exceptions, as a rule.

Writing for Those Habits

So if you’re writing for online publication versus print, this will change how your audience interacts with your work.  Writing using the general upturned-pyramid, as discussed in last week’s Associated Press Style article, is important, whether you’re writing news or not.

The real key, however, is the first paragraph.  You need to hook your audience quickly and that first paragraph is where it needs to happen.  If done well, this can eliminate most skimming.

The other option is to use the hook, but include a lot of bullet points, highlighted lists, or bold text to convey the basic information in a few choice words and phrases throughout the piece.

Either approach works and both of them combined can do a lot for reader retention and interaction.

As an example, if you go through past posts here on AaronTurpen.com, you’ll see that most of my articles have short paragraphs, have headings to break them up into sections for the reader, etc.  This is what helps the reader’s flow.  Short paragraphs make the text look more airy and thus easier to read, removing the stigma of an over-academic appearance.  The headings breaking up the articles into sections make it easier to digest and gives the reader’s eyes something to focus on to gather the general subject matter in that portion of the article.

All of this means better readership, more reader retention, and a higher acceptance for your writing.