Improving your business writing skills involves going back to basics. Mastering the art of persuasive writing means being able to craft a strong sentence. Where you place words, as the natural building blocks of writing, determines the effectiveness of a sentence.
Direct or “active” speech is the most powerful way to write a sentence. Unfortunately many people fall into the trap of writing extremely passively which generally uses too many words and kills sentence flow.
It is just as important to invest time in structuring your website content as it is in designing how it looks.
Creating an intuitive site that anticipates where a visitor is likely to source relevant information is critical to retaining their attention.
The easier is it to locate the specific information they seek, the greater the chance they’ll stick around.
Most website developers provide a wire-frame – or basic blueprint – of your website detailing the main pages. Like building a house, use the sitemap as a starting point before modifying to meet your specific taste.
The majority of websites follow a basic formula to attract visitors. Here are the general points:
Increasingly, prospective job hunters are expected to write email cover letters when submitting a job application.
The popular format shares many similarities with conventional cover letters with a few key exceptions.
Email correspondence is all about catching the reader’s eye before their attention moves on to the next item in their inbox.
Your job is to grab their attention enough to read your resume, grant you an interview and hopefully give you a job.
Below is Cover letter format template you can adapt for your purposes as well as an example of a email cover letter.
SUBJECT HEADING
Either write job description or position number
GREETING
Dear [name of contact]
Second paragraph:
Third paragraph:
Last paragraph:
Politely request they consider your application and convey your appreciation for their time.
Yours sincerely,
[Signature]
If you have the technology to do so, scan your signature and insert it into the document.
Email Cover letter sample
Subject heading
Job position at (organisation’s name)
Greeting
Dear (insert name),
I would like to apply for the (job position) at (organisation name) as advertised on-line at www.seek.com this week.
I worked as a career journalist for ten years in WA which included multiple stints on small rural and regional publications before graduating to the big league, namely The West Australian newspaper where I was employed as a senior court reporter.
I began tutoring a vast range of media units including news writing, feature writing, research skills, sub-editing and design as well as media law and ethics to undergraduate students as a sessional tutor in 2004 and have never looked back.
I currently work as a sessional media tutor at Deakin University at Burwood where my hands-on approach earns me strong praise from my students year after year who value my industry expertise and practical knowledge.
I also work as a professional copywriter and business writing consultant under my own steam but am interested in broadening my scope within the tertiary sphere.
Please find attached my resume. I would welcome an opportunity to meet with you to introduce myself and learn more about future directions you plan to pursue with your new course.
Warm regards,
Anne Gleeson
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