Business Letters: Keep Them Short and To The Point

If you ever draft letters, or any other documents where brevity is important, you'll want to pay close attention to these little practical "tricks of the trade".

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Copyright © Shaun R. Fawcett

If you ever draft letters, or any other documents where brevity is important, you'll want to pay close attention to these little practical "tricks of the trade".
The following is an abridged excerpt from a chapter I have included in a couple of my Writing Kits.

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Anyone who has read any of my articles on the subject of letter writing or resume writing will know how important I believe it is to minimize the number of pages, preferably limiting them to one page wherever possible.

And we all know how tacky it looks when we put the finishing touches on a letter and it overflows onto the second page by one or two lines. Very unprofessional!

So, there are a number of handy little tricks that I've used over the years that will help “squeeze” a letter or other document onto one page without it being noticed by the average reader. These tricks can be applied using any standard word processing software program.

I’m not sure whether a purist at a secretarial school would approve of some of my methods since they may deviate from certain technical standards, but I have used them hundreds of times and nobody has ever been the wiser. The main point being that I was able to keep a letter on one page when the first version overflowed by a few lines onto a second page.

Below are my “page compression tips”, listed in the order in which I suggest you apply them:

1. Move both the left and right margins out about 1/4 in. closer to the edge of the page.

2. Move the top and bottom margins out about 1/4 in. closer to the edge of the page.

3. Edit out the one or two word “overflows”. What I mean here is this: After the letter is drafted take a good look at each paragraph. See if there are any that have an ending sentence that “overflows” onto an additional line for the sake of one word. If so, make a minor edit or two in the paragraph that shortens it a little so that the last word or two will not overflow onto the following line. Using this method, you can often gain two or three extra lines in a one-page letter.

4. Adjust the line spacing on the page. You can gain considerable space on a page by adjusting the line spacing of the text. For example, if the default line spacing is set to “single” at 12 points try setting it to “exactly” at 12 points if your font size is 12. If that doesn’t do it, try “exactly” at “11 pts”. Often you have to experiment a bit with this one to get the look just right.

5. As a last resort, try reducing the size of the font by 1 point size, say from 12 to 11 points.

6. If it still doesn’t “fit”, there’s one final thing you can try if you’re the author of the letter. Go back and edit it one more time. Look for redundant thoughts and phrases, or those that can be combined into one sentence rather than two. Is every word and phrase absolutely essential to your message? You’ll be amazed at the space savings that this process can result in.

As I said earlier, try the above methods in sequence, one-at-a-time, checking each time to see if your latest change has done the trick for you.

What happens if it still won’t fit?

Now, if you’ve used all of the above tricks and you still can’t get the letter to fit onto one page, it’s time to admit that you’ve got a real two-pager. In which case, you should then think about “reversing” some of the compression tricks that you applied when you tried to “squeeze” the letter, and then concentrate on making a balanced looking second page.

There’s nothing worse looking than a letter with a one or two sentence second page! So in this case, you may want to actually “stretch” the letter out a bit.

Often, at this stage I actually increase the line spacing and reduce the margins slightly so that there will be a decent sized overflow onto the second page.

For example, try reversing steps 1, 2 and 4 above. So instead of decreasing the top, bottom and side margins on page one, try increasing them by 1/4 in. all around. Then increase the point size and see if that helps. Ideally, try to get the page to break cleanly at a paragraph break, for a nice tidy page-to-page transition.

Again, I have used these little “compression” tricks thousands of times, and nobody has ever pulled out their ruler and chastised me for inaccuracy.

The important thing is to end up with a professional "looking" letter.

In fact, if you do a very detailed check of the real-life templates included in any one of my Writing Toolkits you would find that I have used one or more of the above tricks on many of them. But, I’m not telling which ones!

Difference Between Short Run Printing And Print On Demand

Short run printing and print on demand are somewhat alike, in terms in process perhaps. However, these two has their own dissimilarities.

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short run printing

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Knowing the difference between short run printing and print on demand is a key point to be able to understand comprehensively these two printing services. Short run printing and print on demand are somewhat alike, in terms in process perhaps. However, these two has their own dissimilarities.

By definition, short run is an industry term used to describe replication or duplication in small quantities, usually from 1-500 copies. Short run printing allows you to print smaller quantities. You can print as few as 500 copies of whatever you need printing, whether it be color post cards, posters, or flyers. Short run printing also means that you can get your printing needs returned to you faster.

And print on demand is a latest technology that uses digital printing techniques to produce standard prints in a rapid and cost-effective process.

In regards to their dissimilarities, print on demand, this is the making of one copy at a time through a diversity of manufacturing methods and short run production, which produces very small amount, mostly used for course adoption and small book-trade orders.

Print on demand is a fairly new adaptation of the short run printing technologies that most of printing companies utilizes to produce high quality short run print. However, there are quite a few differences between short run printing and print on demand printing.

• Print on demand printing typically gives you a choice of standard templates and offer very little custom design and little-to-no thought for your printing project. Short run printing does not offer standard templates.
• Most of print on demand printing service produces books sized to 5.5"x8.5" with no exceptions, thin volume books; they cannot have print on the spine. Very few print on demand service can produce a book with an integrated graphical hardback case-made cover. Short run printing does not require a standard size. Since short run printing can customize the design each book, short run printing can also produces books that are unique and stand out.
• Print on demand printing typically only creates trade hardback books. Short run printing produce completely custom, library edition oversewn or smythsewn hardback books that will last for generations.
• Print on demand printing publish your work on an "as is" basis and leave everything up to you. Short run printing can handle the entire publishing process for you.

No matter how many dissimilarities these two may have they both end up in a the same method, these two uses similar digital printing processes.

Don't Stop Short of The Gold

How many times have you started out with the purest of intentions to fulfill a goal, only to find yourself quitting before you reached it? As you look back, do you imagine where you'd be today if you had accomplished it? What if you were only three steps away from making it happen before you quit? If you could go back in time, what would you do differently to make sure you took those three final steps?

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home-based,home,business,entrepreneur,work from home,work at home,entrepreneurship,job,based,SOHO,solopreneur

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In Napoleon Hill's classic Think and Grow Rich, he tells a true story of a man named R. U. Darby and his uncle who were hit by the "gold fever" during the gold rush.

After having their first car of ore shipped to a smelter, they discovered they had hit one of the richest bodies of gold in Colorado. Excitedly, they continued digging, but the ore vein disappeared.

They kept digging in the hopes of finding the vein again, but when they didn't get the results they were hoping for, they packed it in and sold off their machinery.

The man who bought the machinery realized random digging was not the best way to find the vein. He called in a mining engineer and had him make some calculations.

What contributed to the failure of Darby and his uncle was their lack of knowledge about "fault lines" and their neglect to consider alternatives. With his expert knowledge, the engineer was able to predict that the vein of gold could be found three feet from where the Darby's quit digging, and that's exactly where it was.

Millions of dollars worth of gold were pulled from the mine by the man who decided to not accept easy defeat, and to bring in someone else who had specialized knowledge he didn't.

The lesson here is that success is often just beyond what seems to be your greatest obstacle. Welcome failure and use it as a measuring stick. When you're defeated, look for the lesson. What do you need to change in your approach, your mindset, your environment?

Using a modern day example, I've been working with a personal trainer for several months. During our first few sessions, she was asking me to do what I thought was completely unrealistic.

I was pushing mediocre weights and because I'm a small build, I thought "small results" were the best I could expect to create. When she asked me to lift 50 pounds doing calf raises, I grunted and groaned and told her it wasn't possible. After four reps I wanted to stop and she said, "If you can do four, you can do six … two more!"

With the leg press, my first week she had me up to 100 pounds. I thought I was going to pop all the veins in my head and asked her if she went to sadistic school.

She eventually stopped telling me what weight she was setting the machines at and continued to increase the weights and the reps. I didn't have a clue and said to her after two weeks, "Ha! 50 pound calf raises are a piece of cake, let's up that weight."

She then said to me, "Laurie, you've been lifting 80 pounds for the last two sessions."

She also had me leg pressing 180 pounds in the third week without my knowing.

By the fourth week I had doubled my calf raise weight to 100 pounds and leg press to 200. She had done the same with my upper body exercises and I was lifting weights I never would have allowed myself to attempt.

I would have allowed temporary defeat and a limited mindset keep me at the level I had set for myself. She thought bigger and taught me techniques that allowed me to push harder, lift heavier and grow stronger.

I translated this lesson across to my business thinking and ask that you consider it as well.

The only limits are those you create in your mind. Defeat is merely a produced result. Measure the result, change your approach and continue in your efforts.

2006 © Laurie Hayes - The HBB Source

Discover The Quickest Short Cut To Online Wealth

Private label rights products are the quickest possible short to online wealth today. Even an article like this can make a lot of money effortlessly, in quickest time, if you use the same viral signature technique to your own private label rights software products collection just like this.

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private label rights products, private label rights software

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Private label rights products are the quickest possible short to online wealth today. Even an article like this can make a lot of money effortlessly, in quickest time, if you use the same viral signature technique to your own private label rights software products collection just like this.

There are many types of private label rights products with different kinds of allowed freedom of internet marketing and publishing. Products with private label rights can also be divided into many sub divisions of usage and selling freedoms. Unrestricted private label rights, or, no restriction private label Rights, allow you to do whatever you like to- with these products.

You can stick your name as the author and sell it and also allow your customers to do the same kind of freedom and your customers’ customers to repeat the same, and so on. As you can see there is a huge money making potential with these products, because your visitors who buy this product also have the same opportunity to make money immediately; as they can change your name as the author and stick their name and resell them and quickly make a profit.

Use a graphic software to change their graphics, graphics on the sales page, and sell them as your unique no restriction Private label rights products. Many of the private label rights products available in ‘the ebooks & software’ market are these kind of second generation products.

These products sell like normal first generation private label rights products and make a lot of money just like those unique new private label rights products! This infinite freedom in internet marketing rights makes unrestricted private label rights

products a hot profit making category and hence create a huge demand irrespective of their content or niche.

Since the license is unrestricted private label rights, you can sell or give them away, or do whatever internet marketing method to promote your site as you like. Break them into parts and create smaller products, or combine two or three products with these kinds of no restriction private label rights and create a new unique product of your own, and sell and keep 100% profit.

Or, break them into small parts and make some changes and use as articles, and submit them to article directories and earn valuable back links. Use these articles as your autoresponder series in that particular niche and drive targeted traffic back to your online business web site.

Break these private label rights products into small parts and submit them regularly to your blog and use these blogs to attract search engines to drive targeted traffic to your online business website. Use automated blog submission software to post these parts in regular intervals to trigger search engine spiders to often crawl your blog and hence your online business site to bring a lot of targeted traffic and sales!

The internet marketing methods by using these private label rights products to earn money directly or indirectly are countless. Try to discover some new methods of internet marketing and make use of the true potentials of these incredible unrestricted private label rights products.

If there are short cuts in making money online, then the quickest short cut to acquiring some online wealth is undoubtedly the no restriction or unrestricted private label rights products- Your quickest

shortcut to online wealth.

Continually Trying But Still Falling Short Of Your Business Goals?

Are you continually trying in the hope of earning the level of income you want from your Internet business activities? Is discouragement starting to creep into your thinking? Most people keep on trying in the hope of one day succeeding. However, you won’t succeed unless you address these two key factors.

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small business, home business, business fundamentals, business success

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Are you continually trying in the hope of earning the level of income you want from your Internet business activities? Is discouragement starting to creep into your thinking? Most people keep on trying in the hope of one day succeeding. However, you won’t succeed unless you address these two key factors.

The first factor is "keep on trying". Some people do the same thing over and over again and never learn from the experience. It’s like continually running into a brick wall in the hope of eventually breaking through. Alternatively, they constantly join new affiliate programs or network marketing companies in the belief that this is the magic one to bring them riches. However, they never devote enough effort or attention to any one program to succeed in it.

The second factor is "hope". For some people, they almost have a blind faith that they will succeed. Yet, they don’t understand what is involved in being successful. It’s almost as if they expect that one day circumstances will change and orders will flow in great abundance along with the profits.

For me, the key to "trying until I succeed" is based on testing and tracking. It is like a circular process whereby an idea is implemented, the results are tracked and then evaluated, the idea is refined or modified based on what has been learnt, and the process starts all over again.

If you aren’t earning what you want from your business, you have nothing to lose by applying this concept. First, look at what you are doing to promote your business. Are you using the same advertising you have always used? Do you know if it is working? Test a new headline and track the results. Test a new offer and see what happens to your sales.

Only test one thing at a time so that you know what is causing any changes in your results. Once you have a good performing ad, use it as your benchmark against which all future tests are measured.

The same concept can be applied to all your processes and procedures within your business. Make some changes and test whether they enable you to perform more efficiently and have more time to do the really important activities that generate revenue.

Now let’s look at the second factor, "hope". I once read that genius is 1 percent inspiration and 99 percent perspiration. The same can be said of success. The 1 percent is in setting the goal and the 99 percent is working hard to achieve it. Success doesn’t just happen, it is created by sustained effort and continual learning.

Hope certainly helps to sustain the effort required to succeed, but hope without effort is wasted. Success is based on many small wins that eventually lead to the big win. This understanding of what success really is helps the achievers do what needs to be done.

It is applied to business through goal setting and planning. You set your goal and then determine what you need to do to achieve it. Most successful businesses utilize budgets and business plans as a formalized process of mapping out what is required to achieve the targets they have set.

They then measure their results against these plans so that they know how well they are doing. This enables them to fine tune their plans to take into account new things they have learnt about their market-place and business. It also enables them to take corrective action before it is too late.

To have the success you want in your business, plan how you are going to achieve it. Test the ideas you have and track the results. Use the knowledge gained to improve all aspects of your business. Be opening to learning opportunities so that you can adapt and modify your approach as circumstances change.

Digital Printing + Short Run Process

Short run printing is a great way to print smaller quantities of products that will change occasionally or that are needed right away. This printing technology has been a door opener for many businesses.

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short run, digital, printing, services

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When you need brochures, postcards, business cards or posters printing in small quantities and fast turnaround time, who do you turn to? Surely not The Flash, your comic superhero that possess “super-speed” power. In needs like these you need to turn to your modern day super heroes – the short run printing companies.

Short run printing is a great way to print smaller quantities of products that will change occasionally or that are needed right away. This printing technology is also known as “Print on Demand”. With the document taken straight from disc to press, digital short run printing removes the expense of making plates necessary with traditional print. Hence, this means that small numbers of print jobs can be done cost effectively. Additionally, you can save thousands of dollars and enjoy other advantages like shorter lead-time and personalization.

For some people using short run digital printing systems cost much, does little and has no market. But on the other hand, some people claimed that this technology has redefined their business. This short run technology has transitioned their industry into a more profitable company.

So why use short run digital printing? The answer is simple, it is cost effective. This printing technology provides the quality of conventional lithography printing without the need of having to order large volumes to make up for the cost of printing. Because they can also be personalized they are likewise ideal for direct mail.

Digital printing has been a door opener for many businesses. Because printers sell the same thing as everyone else, everyone tries to claim that their service, quality and price are better than others. For this reason, every printer has to find something that would separate them from everyone else. And some business owners find that they have increased productivity after using digital technology and short run processes. Somehow, these gains can be credited to a combination of better pricing and more efficient press performance.

Let’s say you have greeting cards that need to be printed. Obsolete inventory through the use of short run digital press can be eliminated. This is because with this technology you can print only the needed cards, thus, resulting to orders printed in the exact quantity required. But just the same this kind of printing system is not for everyone. There are risks and changes that need to be dealt with.

Nevertheless, the printing industry will continue to change and improve in the years to come. Thus, all business owners and companies have to do is to determine whether this certain printing technique is what they need.