Business writing is a form of communication between participants in business processes. During the dialogue, many issues are resolved: organizational, legal, commercial, or technical. The purpose of business writing is to convey information, instructions, orders, and directions with attachments. The addressee can be a representative of another organization, an employee, a manager, etc.
Business writing is distinguished by its conciseness and clarity of presentation. The wording should be clear so that the recipient can quickly read and understand what you want to say. The presentation style is neutral and objective.
Also, business writing requires subordination. You can’t use epithets, complex syntactic constructions, and slang. Familiarity, humor, rudeness, sarcasm, and messages outside the topic are excluded. The addressee may misunderstand you.
Rules of Business Writing
To avoid confusion, stick to simple but important communication rules. So, how to write messages so that the addressee understands you correctly? A team of professional writers from the following essay service Smart Writing Service knows the answer.
1. Follow the structure
When a person receives your letter, he or she expects to see the sender’s name, subject, greeting, the essence of the conversation, question or appeal, signature, and contacts. All this is the structure of the business letter. If you put this information in any order, it will be difficult for recipients to find the information they need.
These are the rules for business writing:
- Brief introduction (reasons and purpose of the letter)
- Statement of the essence of the issue (the main idea of the appeal)
- Final part (call to action/summary)
2. Don’t start with a negative phrase
One of the taboos of any business writing is to start communication with rudeness and negativity. Otherwise, your client or partner will have a feeling of instant dislike to the correspondence with you. And the person will stop opening any of your messages.
Never start a letter with expressions like this:
- Unfortunately…
- I am afraid that…
- Unfortunately, we have to inform you that…
- Sorry, but I have to inform you…
3. Give answers to all the questions posed
The next stage is to answer all the questions posed by the client or business partner. It is important to do this with competent transliteration, without unnecessary abbreviations and slang words like “LOL,” “IMHO,” etc. If you are in doubt about some points, inform interlocutors that you will forward their questions to a competent person, and a specialist will answer their questions shortly.
4. Forget about familiarity
Using phrases like “Hey, bro! What’s up!” is applicable only in informal correspondence. In business writing, they are unacceptable. Even if letters are addressed to Mr. Morgan in the UK every week, this doesn’t make him your close friend.
5. Always state the purpose of the letter
The wording of the purpose of the letter should correspond to its content. From the very first seconds of reading, the recipient should clearly understand what will be discussed. Setting a goal saves time and allows people to evaluate the content and make the right decision. In business writing, everything should be extremely clear. There shouldn’t be even the slightest misunderstanding after reading it.
6. Try to keep your writing simple
Don’t use complex constructions and sentences that are difficult to understand. Also, don’t use complex terms. If you need to use the term, but you doubt that the addressee knows it, then give a short transcript of it. This will help avoid misunderstandings and incidents that can negatively affect your cooperation.
Also, if you use terminology, then do it right. It is unacceptable to make mistakes in terms because this betrays your incompetence and negatively affects your reputation. If you are in doubt about the meaning of a word, replace it with another, more understandable one. Also, you can get the advice of a specialist who knows what the term means.
7. Thank the recipient
Respect the time of the recipient and get straight to the point. Always end the correspondence with some kind of request and gratitude for spending time reading your letter. This way, you increase the loyalty of the recipient and emphasize your professionalism.
8. Always double-check your spelling
It is very easy to spoil the first impression of yourself just by writing sentences with mistakes. It may seem trifles, but a general opinion and the seriousness of the intentions are formed about you thanks to literacy. You can put off the text for a while and read it after a few hours. It is much easier to find problem areas and fix them this way.
9. End your letter
If the rules of business writing are not followed, it can negatively affect your reputation. Therefore, at the end of the letter, summarize everything that was said earlier. But it’s not worth stretching the conclusions into 10 sentences. Nevertheless, brevity and laconism are appreciated in business writing. It is better to limit yourself to simple phrases. The ending of your letter should be as polite and correct as possible.
10. Sign correctly
A signature is something that can be useful to the recipient to contact you. When signing a letter, include your first and last name. You can indicate your contacts, additional phone number, or email address. This way, you demonstrate to recipients that you are ready to communicate and cooperate with them.
As you can see, business writing is a powerful tool that can significantly help you. If written correctly, it will certainly positively present you.
