Seminar: Business letter and email writing in German
Writing effective emails and letters in German, replying to complaints respectfully.
Contemporary business letters and emails in German are clear yet personal. In this intensive seminar, participants are provided with simple and effective tools for wording letters and emails in a professional, customer-oriented style. The key to a professional style lies in precise and succinct messages presented in a well-structured format.
Expectations of letters and emails have changed. Anyone writing in the „old style“ today conveys a poor image of their company to customers and other communication associates.
Contemporary letters and emails are clearly structured and precisely worded. They are recipient-focused, easy to understand and free of obsolete phrases or „officialese“.
Seminar objectives: Participants find out how to write in a contemporary style with a range of practical tips and suggestions. They learn how to work out a basic structure for daily letters and emails, enabling them to create texts more quickly, more confidently and with a clear target in mind.
Duration: 1 – 2 days, e.g. 9am. to 5pm.
Preparation
- Participants submit customer letters and emails and the relevant replies for prior analysis and formulate their questions and expectations of the seminar.
Content
- The eight basic principles to follow for a contemporary letter and email style in German
- What no longer works: obsolete („zur Verfügung stehen“), wrong („beiliegend erhalten Sie“), superfluous („wir beziehen uns auf“) or clumsy expressions are replaced with flawless, appropriate and contemporary ones
- Clear, targeted and precise phrasing: drafting letters that are correctly and comprehensibly structured
- Sensible structuring and the best possible line of argument
- Primary and secondary purpose of the customer letter: choose positive, respectful wording which is not patronising
- If necessary: create templates for commonly used texts
- Write with formal precision: be familiar with and apply the guidelines and norms for correspondence
- Optimise letters and emails written by participants
Handbook, quick reference cards and seminar service
- Detailed seminar handbook and handouts with exercises
- A5 quick reference cards as a brief summary
- Supplementary material and photographic minutes by email
- Support after the seminar: simply by email or using the Knowledge Blog – participants are welcome to ask questions and request tips after the seminar