Imagine this... You and your client are out to lunch. You turn to them and say: "Further to our telephone conversation this morning, I wish to acknowledge receipt of your correspondence as of the above date..." They stare back at you and without blinking reply: "Dear Sir, please be advised we look forward to a response to our recent correspondence at your earliest convenience..." Do people really talk like this? Can you imagine telling a client: "Further to our telephone conversation..."? Then why write like it!? Grab a business letter you wrote or received. Chances are, you will see a very similar pattern - people writing to one another as if they were robots programmed to only understand formal speech. DON'T suffer this 'my letter sounds professional and articulate' disorder. You know what? Your clients don't really care if you can use words like 'exacerbate' and 'pontificate' in the same sentence. People just don't understand half of what is said - because that's not how they speak! You want to get the message across as quickly and as easily as possible. Let's see how easy it is to re-word the example above: "Hi Bob! Got your proposal we spoke about yesterday, I'm looking over it" "Great, I'll call you tomorrow to discuss it?" See the difference? You can actually imagine two people saying that to one another. Could you imagine walking up to a customer and saying : "Dear Sir? Exactly so don't do it! Write as you talk. You'll notice a big difference in your response rates. |
