How To Write Effective Business Emails

I read a lot of fiction…

One of the aims of fiction writing is to entertain and whisk the reader away to a different world, into someone else’s life.

At the moment I’m reading a book called The Shipping News by Annie Proulx.

It’s good and so far I’m enjoying it.

She’s doing her job well. It’s easy to get lost in the rich characterisation and strong setting that she establishes through long descriptive paragraphs and realistic dialogue.

But the key word there is ‘lost’.

You see, when you read fiction, as I say, the aim is to get ‘lost’.

You welcome those long descriptive paragraphs as an opportunity to do just that.

In business…

It’s the opposite.

The paragraph problem

When you send any form of correspondence in business, the aim is for the person you’re contacting to clearly understand the point you want to make or the action you wish them to take.

I’m talking here about emails, letters, memos… any written contact you make with colleagues, customers or prospective new business partners.

For example, say you’re contacting a publisher with an idea for a new product.

The thing to remember is that the person who’ll receive your email has probably received a load of similar emails from other people who have their own ideas.

And because their time is likely limited, they don’t want to get ‘lost’ in an email or letter made up of long paragraphs full of unnecessary detail…

They want to open an email, letter or memo that gets straight to the point in a clean and clear way.

Alternatively, you can apply this theory to an email you’d send to a colleague at the work place.

Say you’re working on a project that means you need to ask Susan in Accounts a load of questions.

Susan doesn’t want to get an email in which you fire off all your questions in some mad-long ‘stream of consciousness’ paragraph.

She doesn’t want to have to spend time pulling apart your email and working out each element of your request.

You’re already asking her to do work by answering the questions, so don’t ask her to do any more by working out what your questions are.

So, how do you fix the situation?

How the enter key helps you get more done

First and foremost: use the enter key!

I know, it’s stupid simple. But really it will make a difference.

Whether you’re writing an email, a letter, a memo, or any form of business communication… when a single paragraph starts to get too long – press enter.

That much, at least, will break your communication up into more manageable chunks so that the recipient won’t receive it and start looking for the nearest gun.

To take it a step further, to make your business communication more effective, you should treat it like you’d treat a piece of sales copy.

You see, good sales copy breaks everything down into its simplest form.

The product or service the copy is selling might rely on a big, complicated idea but the aim of the sales copy is to communicate that idea in as simple and as clear way as it can.

Though a sales letter might be long (so that a sound argument can be made), you’ll see that the letter itself is broken down into short sentences and small paragraphs…

That way, the reader doesn’t get ‘lost’.

If you treat your business communication in the same way – into short sentences and small paragraphs – you’ll find you get a much better response.

And a step further…

A good sales letter will tackle every element of a product or service in its own place.

It might at one point in the copy explain how much experience you need and then at another point explain how much you need to initially invest.

In the same way, if you need to make more than one point in your communication, or if you need to ask more than one question… make sure you deal with each element own it’s own. Don’t try lumping everything in together.

It’s all simple stuff, but if you remember this advice next time you’re putting together some form of business communication, I’m sure you’ll find your communication is much more effective.

Category: Business Success