Writing Prompt: Business Letters

Recall what you wrote about the Nigerian emails. Is there anything in your analysis of these letters that might apply to business letters in general?

Then look over the sections on Sales Letters and Request Letters. Which of these tips seem the most helpful?

Open up a word document and begin listing what you've learned about writing letters from the Nigerian emails, from our textbook, and from your own experiences. When you have finished that, begin drafting a letter of request using the story below and using your textbook's guidelines for letters of request.

The Back Story: Your skills as an effective communicator have recently come to the attention of your superiors at the Simply Insurance Company in Tuxedo, Maine. Simply Insurance is a subsidiary of the national insurance company, Total Insurance. The executives at the national branch recently set aside $10,000 for each subsidiary to use to promote communication education in their firm.

You have been asked to design and implement a 3-day workshop on workplace communication. Your first task is to locate a textbook suitable for this workshop. You estimate that 35 employees will attend this one-time workshop, and you want to provide the best possible resources for them. You have heard about a Houghton Mifflin textbook titled, Great Business Writing: Fast and Simple This Time, but you don't want to order 35 copies of this text until you've had a chance to review it and other textbooks. Write a letter of request to the Houghton Mifflin sales rep for the Tuxedo area, Doris Doesright. Ask her for a free copy of this book for your review, and ask that she suggest (and mail you) other textbooks that might work for these workshops as well.

These course materials
are licensed by Lori Ostergaard under a
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