{"id":6277,"date":"2011-11-07T08:00:30","date_gmt":"2011-11-07T15:00:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.paperdirect.com\/blog\/?p=6277"},"modified":"2015-05-27T11:18:07","modified_gmt":"2015-05-27T17:18:07","slug":"how-to-write-a-great-business-letter-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.paperdirect.com\/blog\/2011\/11\/how-to-write-a-great-business-letter-2\/","title":{"rendered":"How to Write a Great Business Letter"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.paperdirect.com\/Teamwork-Letterhead-Papers\/-159082\" target=\"_blank\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-medium wp-image-6445\" title=\"Teamwork Letterhead\" src=\"https:\/\/www.paperdirect.com\/blog\/media\/Teamwork-Letterhead-237x300.jpg\" alt=\"Teamwork Letterhead\" width=\"237\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.paperdirect.com\/blog\/media\/Teamwork-Letterhead-237x300.jpg 237w, https:\/\/www.paperdirect.com\/blog\/media\/Teamwork-Letterhead-118x150.jpg 118w, https:\/\/www.paperdirect.com\/blog\/media\/Teamwork-Letterhead-276x350.jpg 276w, https:\/\/www.paperdirect.com\/blog\/media\/Teamwork-Letterhead.jpg 316w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 237px) 100vw, 237px\" \/><\/a>Though we live in a world in which most correspondence is accomplished electronically, the old-fashioned <a href=\"https:\/\/www.paperdirect.com\/Letterhead\">business letter<\/a> on paper is not entirely obsolete. Writing a great business letter is a skill that all business owners must have, and if you require your employees to write business letters, you must provide them with the education on how to write a great business letter, too.<\/p>\n<p>Younger employees, especially, are very dependent upon writing\/corresponding using only electronic media, but there may come a time when they will be called upon to write a business letter the old-fashioned way&#8211;in paragraph format to be printed out and mailed (or sent electronically). Here are some tips to write a great business letter:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Keep it short by avoiding useless words and unnecessary information.<\/li>\n<li>Avoid cliches and other trite sayings.<\/li>\n<li>Use familiar language.<\/li>\n<li>Use short sentences and paragraphs.<\/li>\n<li>Write in conversational style, if appropriate (if it&#8217;s more formal, then use more formal language).<a href=\"https:\/\/www.paperdirect.com\/Paint-Cans-Letterhead-Papers\/-160042\" target=\"_blank\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-medium wp-image-6447\" title=\"Paint Cans Letterhead\" src=\"https:\/\/www.paperdirect.com\/blog\/media\/Paint-Cans-Lettrhead-2-237x300.jpg\" alt=\"Paint Cans Letterhead\" width=\"237\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.paperdirect.com\/blog\/media\/Paint-Cans-Lettrhead-2-237x300.jpg 237w, https:\/\/www.paperdirect.com\/blog\/media\/Paint-Cans-Lettrhead-2-118x150.jpg 118w, https:\/\/www.paperdirect.com\/blog\/media\/Paint-Cans-Lettrhead-2-276x350.jpg 276w, https:\/\/www.paperdirect.com\/blog\/media\/Paint-Cans-Lettrhead-2.jpg 316w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 237px) 100vw, 237px\" \/><\/a><\/li>\n<li>Get to the point quickly (in the first paragraph).<\/li>\n<li>Stay on topic.<\/li>\n<li>Be sincere, friendly and professional.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>When writing a great business letter, it&#8217;s important to use only active verbs, not passive. Here is an example of a passive verb phrase. Note how long-winded and formal it sounds:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>The documentation of the purchase will be provided by our marketing staff two weeks from today.\u00a0 (passive voice)<\/li>\n<li>Our marketing staff will provide documentation of the purchase two weeks from today. (active voice)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Active voice is more informal and more akin to how we speak to other people in everyday conversation.<a href=\"https:\/\/www.paperdirect.com\/Light-Bulb-Letterhead-Papers\/-159326\" target=\"_blank\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-medium wp-image-6440\" title=\"Light Bulb Letterhead\" src=\"https:\/\/www.paperdirect.com\/blog\/media\/Light-Bulb-Letterhead-237x300.jpg\" alt=\"Light Bulb Letterhead\" width=\"237\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.paperdirect.com\/blog\/media\/Light-Bulb-Letterhead-237x300.jpg 237w, https:\/\/www.paperdirect.com\/blog\/media\/Light-Bulb-Letterhead-118x150.jpg 118w, https:\/\/www.paperdirect.com\/blog\/media\/Light-Bulb-Letterhead-276x350.jpg 276w, https:\/\/www.paperdirect.com\/blog\/media\/Light-Bulb-Letterhead.jpg 316w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 237px) 100vw, 237px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>There are basically two formats used when writing a great business letter: block and modified block style.<\/p>\n<p>To learn more about <a class=\"wp-oembed\" title=\"Blog post\" href=\"https:\/\/www.paperdirect.com\/blog\/2011\/02\/how-to-write-a-great-business-letter\/\" target=\"_blank\">business letter writing<\/a> and other aspects of being part of a successful business, please read other PaperDirect blogs on the subject of branding your business.\u00a0 And don&#8217;t forget to look at PaperDirect&#8217;s\u00a0 full line of <a class=\"wp-oembed\" title=\"Business Stationery\" href=\"https:\/\/www.paperdirect.com\/Letterhead\" target=\"_blank\">business stationery<\/a>, <a class=\"wp-oembed\" title=\"Brochures\" href=\"https:\/\/www.paperdirect.com\/Brochures\" target=\"_blank\">brochures<\/a>, and <a title=\"Business Cards\" href=\"https:\/\/www.paperdirect.com\/Business-Cards\" target=\"_blank\">business cards<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Though we live in a world in which most correspondence is accomplished electronically, the old-fashioned business letter on paper is<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":6440,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[51],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6277","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-designing-business-communication"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.paperdirect.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6277"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.paperdirect.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.paperdirect.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.paperdirect.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.paperdirect.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6277"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.paperdirect.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6277\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14781,"href":"https:\/\/www.paperdirect.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6277\/revisions\/14781"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.paperdirect.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6440"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.paperdirect.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6277"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.paperdirect.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6277"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.paperdirect.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6277"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}