"Words Are All We Have"

Historically, small businesses have relied on personal contact and word of mouth to obtain new customers and select suppliers. The owners of most successful small businesses still know their customers individually and the personalized service they give is a key to their success. While this is still true, and it is certainly true of my own business and the small businesses of my customers, it is changing. I have several suppliers who are small businesses and with whom I have only ever had contact by e-mail. I also have a few customers in the same category. I don't know any of the usual things about them. I don't even know where some of them live. All I have is a name, an e-mail address, a valid credit card number or a product that works. I also have their e-mail correspondence.

In this type of interaction, the written word becomes very important. As is the case elswhere on the Internet, personal characteristics which tend to have great importance in other personal dealings, become irrelevant. You are not the same person you are elsewhere - you are what you write.

While a lot of Internet interaction relies on the written word, what you write may not be as important in a discussion group or when posting a message. In business however, establishing trust as a business and deciding to trust as a customer are fundamental to business and a wrong decision can have nasty consequences. As a business, you must be able to write in such a way as to convince potential customers that you are the reputable and trustworthy operation which you (presumably) are.

Key factors in such writing are vocabulary and spelling. If you can't take the trouble to get your spelling right in business correspondence, than how are you going to get delivery times and prices right? If you can't take the trouble to find the right word to express exactly what you mean, how are you producing quality in your product?

Many word processors have tools, like spell chec and thesaurus, which can help with both tasks. They will define words, give their spelling, and give you related words in several categories. If it gives your writing that extra edge which will convince some potential customers that the care you take with your writing is reflected in your operation, then it's worth it.

FIRST PUBLISHED AT SUITE101.COM