Principles of Business Correspondence

I. Elements of Business Correspondence
Business correspondence should be professional and direct. While the main purpose of the letter is to to get a point across or your request known, you need to try to do this while still cultivating and maintaining a good relationship with the recipient.

Most professional correspondence should have a letterhead, date, address and salutation.

Additionally, the main elements of your business letter should be as follows:
Opening: This is the reason for writing the letter. It should be direct and apparent, It is in this paragraph where you are delivering important news or requesting something.
Body: The body of the letter develops the information presented in the opening. This is where you are able to go into a more detailed description of what you are asking from your correspondent.
Closing: This is the end of your letter. It should be where you are leading the recipient of your letter toward a specific response or a course of action. This section might include suggestions or statements. Don't forget to finish your letter with a complimentary closing and a signature.

II. Qualities of an Effective Business Correspondence
In order to achieve desired result in business, we need to correspond with utmost care. This correspondence can be oral as well written but whatsoever it is we must keep few principles in our mind. These principles constitute 7Cs of Business Correspondence. Although these are just seven small words starting with alphabet ‘C’ they are the most important features of business communication. These can be understood as follows:
Completeness: When a message is transmitted the audience (reader/listener) desires complete information to be presented. A muddled message or half message creates confusion in the mind of the audience. A chain of who-what-when-where-why questions must be addressed in the process of information presentation. When these questions are addressed the scope of confusion in the mind of the audience becomes minimal. These questions also help the writer/speaker deal with other business activities of letter writing.
For example: If a customer enquires about a particular product is the responsibility of the person-in-charge to give detailed information in a short span of time along with some additional information that the customer is not aware of. This process helps in building good business relation.
Conciseness: Conciseness refers to ‘conveying complete message with the help of minimum words possible’. It is a pre-requisite of business correspondence as it is said in the field of business that ‘time saved is money saved’. Hence, a concise letter saves time and expense of both the parties.
How to achieve conciseness is a big question! Consider the following:
No wordy expressions: instead of ‘at this time’ one can use ‘now’.
Only relevant details: Instead of providing a complete list of products along with their features and the product use manual only a comprehensive list of products with their salient features can be provided when a customer asks for the list of products.
Avoiding repetition: A repeated word can make the whole information boring. Sometimes repetition is necessary in case to lay focus on particular information but this should not be practiced without more than one reason. Again this should also not be practiced more often
Consideration: It refers to the receiver’s intention/interest. While transmitting information one must keep the interest of the target audience in mind. This is important because we communicate to make the audience understand our information. If they do not understand our information it is the failure of the whole communication.
For example: if the Business Communication teacher uses figurative metaphorical language the students might find it difficult to understand.
Concreteness: It refers to the characteristics of the information. In order to inform a specific audience about specific information, one must not use general sense. A specific message must be convey in a specific way with specific information rather than in a generic way with general message. Choosing a general way for specific information may lead to the problems of misunderstanding. When we talk to our clients we must use facts and figures in the place of generic and irrelevant information.
Clarity: The purpose of Clarity is achieving Accuracy. For the audience to understand the information easily, the information must be very clear. In effective business correspondence, familiar and easy words and short and effective sentences and paragraph construction help the audience in understanding the information. Use of jargons and complex sentences leads to misunderstandings. If there is a choice between jargons and familiar words or a simple sentence and a complex sentence one must choose familiar words and simple words.
Courtesy: The knowledge of the audience is very important while communicating. It allows the sender to use statement of courtesy. Not only the perspective of the audience but also their feelings eases the situation and the sender can be courteous in true sense. Courtesy leads to stronger business relationships. One must make the audience feel important and concerned therefore using socially accepted forms of politeness adds positives to the sender. The sender must be tactful in using the words and tone.
Correctness: Correct use of grammar, punctuation and spellings are a must for business correspondence. Incorrect grammar, punctuation and spelling leads to highest level of misunderstandings. There are three characteristics of correctness:
Use of correct level of language and paralanguage
Use of correct facts, figures and words
Use of correct mechanics of writing (formats). III. Components and formats of business correspondence
Components
business letter consist of letter head on which are printed a dateline, an inside address, a salutation, a subject line, the body of the letter, a complimentary closing, a signature block, an ID line and notation.
Dateline
usually keyed 2.5 inches/15 lines below the top edge or .5 inch/3 lines below the letterhead. should be written out December 15, 2011 inside address states the title and address of the person for whom the letter is intended. for a physician- Dr.____ or ____M.D. ___M.D. is preferred
Salutation
Keyed flush with the left margin on the second line below the inside address. should refer to the receiver on the letter,using a title and surname (last name) Dear Mrs Brown. If the receiver and sender know each other well, first name may be used. in formal correspondence, is followed by a colon, a comma should be used in informal.
Subject used to bring the subject of the letter to the readers attention. should be typed 2 lines below the salutation and two lines above the body of the letter
Body
begins two lines below the salutation or subject line. is single spaced with a blank line between paragraphs. leave a blank line above and below a list, and indent each item on the list .5 inch from the left margin.

Complimentary closing placed two lines below the last line of the body and consisting of one of the following- Sincerely, Yours truly, Best regards. followed by a coma. one the first letter of the first word is capitalized.
Signature block contains the senders name on the first line and title on the second. should be typed four lines below to allow the signature.
*signed by the MA- routine business nature/supply orders
*signed by the doctor- medical reports, letters by the insurance company, consultation or referral letters and letters clinical in nature.
ID line typist initials are sometimes included two lines below the signature block. the traditional full form includes the initials of the person responsible for creating the letter followed by a colon or a slash and then the typist;s initials
Notation
includes information such as the number and type of enclosure and the names of other people who receive copies of the letter. typed two lines below the signature block or ID line.
Full block typed with all lines in standard letter format, flush left. quick and easy to write. one of the most common formats used in medical practice
Modified block all lines begin at the left margin, with the exception of the date line, complimentary closing and keyed signature, which usually begins at the center position
Simplified
all lines are keyed flush with the left margin. most modern letter style. in most situations in a medical office, style may be to informal.
Envelopes
three common used sizes-6 3/4, 7 and 10 (also called business size). most common in the medical office are 6 3/4 and 10. 6 3/4 with a window is often used for mailing statements
Return address for the sender should be placed in the upper left corner