October 11, 2010 · Filed under Tips of the Trade · Tagged advertise, advertising, all, article, ask, blog, blogging, book, books, business, call, career, college, confirm, confirm receipt, consequences, conversation, costs, cover letter, cruise, dates, decision, detail, dfw, discount, discount offer, discussion, doing, doing business, event, facebook, Falcon, follow, follow up letter, follow-up, follow-up notes, free, freelance, good sales cover letter, good sales letter, google, hallowed ground, halloween, home, home-based business, how to, how to write a follow up letter, information, interest, ladye, lax, letter, literature, mail, meeting, meeting or event, message, metallica, movie, movies, music, net, notes, Obama, offer, opportunity, oral, oral agreement, original, original message, pagan, penthouse, people involved, person, photo, pic, pics, plans, playboy, pleasure, plinky, porn, presentation, product, product information, product or service, products, quantities, query, read, receipt, religion, request, richbydesign.wordpress.com, ritual, sales, sales cover letter, sales letter, sales presentation, samhain, school, service, services, substance, telephone, telephone call, text, text message, texting, thank, time, times, tips, travel, unanswered request, vacation, verify, Wiccan, work, work-from-home, write, write a good letter, write a good sales cover letter, write a sales letter, writer, writing
In a general Follow-Up Letter, refer to the key idea (the meeting, your last letter, the unacknowledged gift) and mention the reason for writing the present letter (“as I hadn’t heard from you” or “I wanted to remind you”). If you are asking your reader to do something, say so clearly (“Please call me,” “Let me know if it arrived,” or “Send your payment now”).
When following up a telephone call or face-to face conversation, begin by referring to your meeting or telephone visit. Recap the conversation, repeating accurately the details of your talk: what decision was made, dates, times, quantities, plans, costs, people involved, and so forth. Ask the person to verify that this was the substance of your discussion. State what you expect next of the other person. Express appreciation for their interest or pleasure in the forthcoming meeting.
When you must write a Follow-Up Letter to an unanswered request, query, or letter, repeat your original message (or include a copy of it, even). You may want to go into a little more detail this time on the need or importance of the person’s response and what consequences for you or for the other person might arise from a failure to respond.
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When following up a Sales Presentation, your letter is primarily a good Sales Letter, but you also thank the person for the time and opportunity to explain your product or service and you emphasize the one or two features that the person seemed most taken with during your presentation. Express your appreciation of their business, office, plant as well as your pleasure in the possibility of doing business with them.
When a meeting or event has been scheduled many months in advance, it’s sometimes necessary to send Follow-Up Notes reminding people. Repeat all the information along with a pleasant remark about hoping to see the person.
What NOT to Say:
• Avoid implying that your reader is thoughtless, negligent, forgetful, or impolite when writing about an unanswered letter or unacknowledged gift. There is always the possibility of mail going astray. Even if they have been lax in responding, they won’t like you any better for pointing it out to them! Try to keep your irritation and frustration from showing through.
• A Follow-Up Letter should not be a simple repeat of an earlier communication (except in the case of confirming an oral agreement or discussion). It should have some specific (even if thin) excuse for being written – to confirm receipt of something, for example.
Punching It Up A Notch
Tips on Writing
When you receive no response to a Sales Letter and you send a Follow-Up, you begin by referring to your previous letter (“I wrote you several weeks ago to tell you about…” or “Did you receive the certificate we sent you, good for…?”). The rest of the letter is primarily a good Sales Letter but should emphasize a different benefit or aspect than your first letter did (tell them something new). This letter should also be shorter or perhaps, longer than the first and with all likelihood, a different tone, all together.
When a customer requests product information or literature, you fill the request and write a good sales cover letter to accompany the material. It is customary to write a Follow-Up Letter several weeks later. Refer to the earlier letter, thank them for their interest, offer further information, and then either mention a representative who will call on them, give them an order blank with a first-order discount offer, urge them to call a toll-free number to order, or make some other action-oriented proposal.
Too often, communication ceases once the customer has paid for the product or service. However, aggressive businesse s will keep in touch with such customers, sending Follow-Up Letters to see how things are working out, to inform customers of new product lines, to remind them that you appreciated their business in the past and hope to serve them, again.
Also See Article: Follow-up Letters
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October 4, 2010 · Filed under Tips of the Trade · Tagged advertise, advertising, adword, all, article, blog, blogging, book, books, business, career, college, cruise, Falcon, follow up letter, follow-up, free, free movies online, free music online, freelance, google, home, home-based business, how to, ladye, movie, movies, music, news, Obama, pagan, penthouse, photo, pic, pics, playboy, plinky, porn, read, religion, sales letter, school, tips, travel, vacation, Wiccan, work, work-from-home, write, writer, writing
“Don’t fill more than a page and a half with apologies for not having written sooner!”
(Lewis Carroll, Eight or Nine Wise Words About Letter Writing)
A follow-up letter (postal or via email) refers to an earlier letter, conversation, or meeting and is a graceful way of tying up a loose end, reminding someone to carry through on a promised action, building on something that went before, or spreading goodwill. This little personal touch, which takes three minutes, makes an enormous impression. The ones who do it regularly in business are such standouts. They’re the ones who jump ahead.
Write a Follow-Up Letter When
· You have not had a response to a letter of yours and you need to remind someone that you are waiting for answers, information, confirmation, or merchandise.
· Your telephone messages have not been returned
· You wish to remind someone of an appointment, meeting, favor, request, inquiry, invitation, payment, or work deadline.
· A sales letter or product literature has not produced a response.
· Your initial sales letter brings a response (order, expression of interest, request for more information) and you want to amplify the material in your first letter, encourage the customer to order or to buy again, and to keep in touch with the customer for goodwill reasons.
· You want to follow-up on a sales call or demonstration.
· You want to verify with a customer that a shipping problem or missing order has been settled to their satisfaction.
· After business lunches, dinners, meetings, or other hospitality you want to express appreciation and acknowledge what was accomplished.
· You wish to sum up what was accomplished in a meeting or interview so that there is a record and so that your estimate of what went on can be verified by others.
· You need to confirm a meeting date, a telephone or other oral agreement, a message left with a third-party.
· A gift you sent has not been acknowledged and you want to know whether it arrived.
· You have visited a school, university, or college as a prospective student, or have attended a meeting as a guest and potential member, and wish to express your appreciation and impressions.
· Someone has visited your school, university, college, or organization as an applicant and you wish to express appreciation and the hopes that they are interested.
· You want to send omitted or supplemental material or to revise an earlier correspondence.
*****So, now we know when the right time is to send a follow-up letter but, how about HOW to write that letter? READ MORE HERE
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June 14, 2010 · Filed under My Two Cents · Tagged employment, Falcon, job, ladye, music, work, writing
* Complain A Lot: When you’re tired, running low on sleep – be sure to tell everyone (especially, your boss) throughout the entire day just how tired you are and how all you want to do is go home and go to bed
* Call-In Sick: You know those days when you just want to hang-out with your friends/girlfriend/boyfriend – whomever – and going to work just seems to ruin all the fun that you could be having? Well, just call up your boss and make up some really good fib so that you won’t have to go in – Oh, and be sure to wait to call in until just before you are due to clock in, now!
* Whine: You received your schedule for the week and your boss has you working a couple of over-night shifts (extra hours and all that nonsense) and you really don’t like that very much. So, what do you do? Well, of course, you would go straight up to him/her and let it be clearly understood that you have no desire to take on those hours and would he/she please find someone else to do it.
* Be Lazy: Don’t you just hate having to fill out all that paperwork every time you have to work or having to do that stupid mopping or facing of products on shelves – or whatever? Shoot, nobody will really notice if you skip it now and then, right? Someone else (your boss, most likely) can finish up those little tasks later on after you’ve clocked out so, just kick back and relax – your shift will be over soon and you can bolt right out the door like lightening!
* Just Say NO: You’re hanging out with your family/friends and the phone rings with your boss on the line. Someone has called in sick at the last minute and you are asked to come in. What a bummer! You weren’t planning on having to go to work, today – that wasn’t on the schedule and your boss can’t get mad at you for not coming in to cover someone else’s shift, right? Just say NO! Stick to your schedule (not counting those days that you call in and someone else has to cover YOUR shift/duties). It’s much more fun to stay home and party, right?
~E
June 14, 2010 · Filed under Hot Topics, Tips of the Trade · Tagged books, career, computer, cover letter, essay, Falcon, freelance, grammar, internet, job, ladye, music, report, resume, write
Informal language
When writing, it is very important to use language that fits the audience you are writing for and the type of message you want to convey.
If you are writing a cover letter for a job application or a college academic essay, you should write in a formal style.
If you are writing a letter to a friend or something personal, you should use a more informal style.
For example,
At the end of a job application letter, you would write: “Looking forward to seeing you.”
Whereas, at the end of a letter to a friend, you would write: “see you soon” / “see you” or even CU.
However, forms like ‘LOL’, ‘congrats’ or ‘wanna’ are inappropriate in more formal settings, such as business correspondence.
Basically, you need to match your writing (or speaking) style, format and vocabulary to fit your intended audience. You want to capture his/her/their attention and KEEP IT that way. You want to speak/type in a language that is fitting to both the situation as well as the recipient in order to obtain the best possible results.
~E
May 20, 2010 · Filed under Hot Topics, Uncategorized · Tagged clouds, damage, doppler, drama, earthquake, Falcon, forecast, freelance, hail storm, hurricane, ladye, music, news, radio, storm, storm damage, texas, tornado, tornadoes, weather, write, writer, writing
Tornado Fact 1. The deadliest ever tornado was the ‘Tri-State’ tornado that passed through Missouri, Illinois and Indiana on March 18th 1925. During its 3½ hour life this tornado killed 695 people along its 219 mile path.
Tornado Fact 2. Tornadoes are measured and rated using the Fujita scale.
Tornado Fact 3. Tornadoes tend to occur in mid-latitudes, and as they are restricted to land masses this means mainly in the northern hemisphere.
Tornado Fact 4. Those over the US tend to be the most violent as the North American continent has a combination of warm, moist Gulf air from the south colliding with cold air travelling down from the north west, producing ideal tornado forming conditions.
Tornado Fact 5. On some days up to 20 tornadoes may be spotted in Tornado Alley- the flat country of the mid-west stretching from Texas through to Oklahoma and Kansas.
Tornado Fact 6. A wind speed of 280mph was ascribed to a tornado that hit Texas in April 1958
Tornado Fact 7. The average life-span of a tornado is approximately 15 minutes. However some can last much longer – On 26th May 1917 the Mattoon-Charleston Tornado lasted seven and a half hours and travelled 293 miles.
Tornado Fact 8. A ‘super Outbreak’ of tornadoes during 3rd and 4th April 1974 saw 148 individual tornadoes cross and devastate and area from Alabama to Michigan.
Tornado Fact 9. Although they can and do travel in any direction, the majority of tornadoes travel from south-west to north-east.
Tornado Fact 10. The US endures around 750 tornadoes annually.
Tornado Fact 11. Tornadoes can occur at any time of the year, although there tends to be a peak in the US in Tornado Alley during May and June.
Tornado Fact 12. Few people survive seeing the inside of a tornado vortex. Bill Keller from Kansas survived such a vortex in June 1928: “A screaming, hissing sound came directly from the end of the funnel, and when I looked up I saw right into the very heart of the tornado…it was brilliantly lit with constant flashes of lightning…around the rim of the vortex, small tornadoes were constantly breaking away and writhing their way around the funnel”
Tornado Fact 13. The inside of the funnel contains extremely low pressure equal to the pressure difference between ground level and an altitude of 4,900 feet – giving huge suction power
Tornado Fact 14. In the town of Natchez, Mississippi, in 1840 a tornado one mile wide touched down killing 48 people on land and drowning a further 269 in river boats and steam ships on the Mississippi river.
Tornado Fact 15. A waterspout is a tornado that occurs over water rather than land. However they are generally less violent, and will not move systematically northeastwards like a tornado would.
Tornado Fact 16. A bridge is not a good place to shelter from a tornado! Generally the confined space will increase the overall wind speed. This is despite well known TV footage of a news crew sheltering under a bridge. They did not receive a direct hit from the tornado and the bridge was of a rare design where they could crawl amongst the exposed girders for shelter and grip.
Tornado Fact 17. The most northerly tornado ever observed was on August 26th, 1976 at Kiana, Alaska, 54 miles north of Anchorage.
Tornado Fact 18. Well this is advice, more than fact. If you are caught out in the open by a tornado with no nearby buildings to shelter in, lie in a ditch, or lowest possible area, and protect your head and neck with your arms. Then pray.
Drop, Tuck and Pray!!!
Tornado Fact 19. Tornadoes are transparent, and appear so in the early stages of development, until dust and debris are picked up and give them colour.
Tornado Fact 20. Only 2% of tornadoes are classed as violent (F4 and F5), but these account for 70% of all tornado deaths.
Tornado Fact 21. 70% of all tornadoes are weak (F0 and F1), and account for less than 5% of all tornado deaths.
Tornado Fact 22. 50% of all fatalities from tornadoes occur amongst residents of mobile homes.
Tornado Fact 23. Hurricane Beulah spawned 115 tornadoes over Texas in September 1967.
** This season, as you are faced with the Mighty Storms that roll across our land, take care to stay observant to weather updates and suggestions given you from your local news/weather stations and community Emergency Systems. Stay safe, everyone!
~E
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