220 Unit 3: Brief Business Messages

Level 3: Document Critique

The following document may contain errors in grammar, capitalization, punctuation, abbreviation, number style, word division, and vocabulary. As your instructor indicates, photocopy this page and correct all errors using standard proofreading marks (see Appendix C) or download the document and make the corrections in your word processing software.

TO: all.employees

SUBJECT: Health insurance—Changes

Unlike many companies, Bright Manufacturing has always paid a hundred % of medical car insurance for it’s employees, absorbing the recent 10–20 percent annual cost increases in order to provide this important benefit. This year; Blue Cross gave us some terrible news: the cost increase for our employee’s medical coverage would be a staggering fourty percent per month next year

To mange the increase and continue to offer you and your family highquality medical coverage we have negotiated several changes with Blue Cross; a new cost saving alternative is also being offered by us:

Under the Blue Cross Plus plan, copay amounts for office visits will be ten dollars next year/ $50 for emergency room visits.

80 % of employees’ insurance coverage (including 10 percent of the cost increase) will be paid by Bright next year and 100 % of the prescription drug costs (including a 23 percent cost increase). The

remaining twenty percent of medical coverage will be deducted by us monthly from your salary, if you choose to remain on a Blue Cross Plus plan. We realize this is alot, but its still less than many companies charge their employees.

A fully paid alternative health plan, Blue Cross HMO, will now be provided by Bright at no cost to employees. But be warned that there is a deadline. If you want to switch to this new plan you must do so during our open enrollment period, Nov. 20 to December 1, and we will not consder applications for the change after that time so don’t get your forms in late.

There are forms available in the Human Resources office for changing your coverage. They must be returned between November 20 and December 1. If you wish to remain on a Blue Cross Plus policy, you do not need to notify us; payroll deductions for company employees on the plan will occur automatic beginning January first.

If you have questions, please call our new Medical Benefits Information line at ext. 3392. Our Intranet sight will also provide you easy with information about health care coverage online if you click the “Medical Benefits” icon. Since our founding in 1946, we have provided our company employees with the best medical coverage available. We all hate rising costs and although things are looking bleak for the future but we’re doing all we can do to hold on to this helpful benefit for you.

Lucinda Goodman, Benefits Mangr., Human resources

References

1.Matt Rhodes, “Social Media as a Crisis Management Tool,” Social Media Today blog, 21 December 2009, www

.socialmediatoday.com.

2.Katie Grasso, “Deliver Bad News to Workers Face-to- Face, with Empathy,” (Camden, New Jersey) Courier-Post, 8 February 2006, www.courierpostonline.com.

3.Ian McDonald, “Marsh Can Do $600 Million, but Apologize?” Wall Street Journal, 14 January 2005, C1, C3;

Adrienne Carter and Amy Borrus, “What If Companies Fessed Up?” BusinessWeek, 24 January 2005, 59–60; Patrick J. Kiger, “The Art of the Apology,” Workforce Management, October 2004, 57–62.

4. “The Power of Apology: Removing the Legal Barriers,” A Special Report by the Ombudsman of the Province of British Columbia, February 2006, www.ombud.gov.bc.ca; Ameeta Patel and Lamar Reinsch, “Companies Can

Apologize: Corporate Apologies and Legal Liability,”

Business Communication Quarterly, March 2003, www

.elibrary.com.

5.John Guiniven, “Sorry! An Apology as a Strategic PR Tool,” Public Relations Tactics, December 2007, 6.

6.Howard Stringer, “A Letter from Howard Stringer,” PlayStation Blog, 5 May 2011, http://blog.us.playstation.com.

7.Quinn Warnick, “A Close Textual Analysis of Corporate Layoff Memos,” Business Communication Quarterly, September 2010, 322–326.

8.Christopher Elliott, “7 Ways Smart Companies Tell Customers ‘No’,” CBS Money Watch, 7 June 2011, www.cbsnews

.com.

9.Omowale Casselle, “Really, You Want ME to Write YOU a LinkedIn Recommendation,” RecruitingBlogs, 22 April 2010, www.recruitingblogs.com.

10.“LinkedIn Profiles to Career Introductions: When You Can’t Recommend Your Friend,” Seattle Post-Intelligencer Personal Finance blog, 16 November 2010, http://blog

.seattlepi.com.

11.Neal Schaffer, “How Should I Deal with a LinkedIn Recommendation Request I Don’t Want to Give?” Social Web School, 20 January 2010, http://humancapitalleague.com.

12.Dawn Wolf, “Job Applicant Rejection Letter Dos and Donts—Writing an Appropriate ‘Dear John’ Letter to an Unsuccessful Applicant,” 31 May 2009, Employment Blawg

.com, www.employmentblawg.com.

13.Wolf, “Job Applicant Rejection Letter Dos and Donts”; “Prohibited Employment Policies/Practices,” U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, accessed 14 July 2010, www.eeoc.gov; Susan M. Heathfield, “Candidate Rejection Letter,” About.com, accessed 14 July 2010, http:// humanresources.about.com; “Rejection Letters Under Scrutiny: 7 Do’s & Don’ts,” Business Management Daily,

1 April 2009, www.businessmanagementdaily.com.

14.Judi Brownell, “The Performance Appraisal Interviews: A Multipurpose Communication Assignment,” Bulletin of the Association for Business Communication 57, no. 2 (1994): 11–21.

15.Susan Friedfel, “Protecting Yourself in the Performance Review Process,” Workforce Management, April 2009, www

.workforce.com.

16.Kelly Spors, “Why Performance Reviews Don’t Work— And What You Can Do About It,” Independent Street blog, Wall Street Journal, 21 October 2008, http://blogs.wsj.com.

17.Rita Pyrillis, “Is Your Performance Review Underperforming?” Workforce Management, May 2011, 20–22, 24–25.

18.Friedfel, “Protecting Yourself in the Performance Review Process.”

19.E. Michelle Bohreer and Todd J. Zucker, “Five Mistakes Managers Make When Terminating Employees,” Texas Lawyer, 2 May 2006, www.law.com; Deborah Muller, “The Right Things to Do to Avoid Wrongful Termination Claims,” Workforce Management, October 2008, www

.workforce.com; Maria Greco Danaher, “Termination: Telling an Employee,” Workforce Management, accessed

14July 2010, www.workforce.com.

20.Matt Rhodes, “Build Your Own Community or Go Where People Are? Do Both,” FreshNetworks blog, 12 May 2009, www.freshnetworks.com.

21.Barbara Gibson, “Straight Talk,” Communication World, May–June 2012, 16–22.

22.Micah Solomon, “Mean Tweets: Managing Customer Complaints,” CNBC, 22 February 2012, www.cnbc.com; “When Fans Attack: How to Defend a Brand’s Reputation Online,” Crenshaw Communications blog, 20 May 2010, http://crenshawcomm.com; Leslie Gaines-Ross, “Reputation Warfare,” Harvard Business Review, December 2010, 70–76; David Meerman Scott, “The US Air Force: Armed with Social Media,” WebInkNow blog, 15 December 2008, www

.webinknow.com; Matt Rhodes, “How to React If Somebody Writes About Your Brand Online,” FreshNetworks blog,

9 January 2009, www.freshnetworks.com; Rhodes, “Social Media as a Crisis Management Tool.”

23.Adapted from “Bathtub Curve,” Engineering Statistics Handbook, National Institute of Standards and Technology website, accessed 16 April 2005, www.nist.gov; Robert Berner, “The Warranty Windfall,” BusinessWeek,

20December 2004, 84–86; Larry Armstrong, “When Service Contracts Make Sense,” BusinessWeek,

20December 2004, 86.

24.Adapted from Twitter/JetBlue website, accessed 15 July 2010, http://twitter.com/JetBlue.

25.Adapted from Lee Valley website, accessed 29 October 2008, www.leevalley.com.

9

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Writing Persuasive Messages

LEARNING OBJECTIVES

After studying this chapter, you will be able to

1Apply the three-step writing process to persuasive messages.

2Describe an effective strategy for developing persuasive business messages.

3Identify the three most common categories of persuasive business messages.

4Describe an effective strategy for developing marketing and sales messages, explain how to modify this approach for social media, and identify steps you can take to avoid ethical lapses in marketing and sales messages.

Sonia Simone emphasizes the power of trust in persuasive communication; without it, you’ll have a hard time convincing people to change their beliefs or behaviors.

Sonia Simone

Sonia Simone was discussing the fear that keeps online shoppers from completing a transaction, but her insight applies to every form of persuasive communication.1 Whether you’re trying to convince people to help fund your new business via Kickstarter, asking your boss for a raise, or promoting a concert, trust is an essential element of persuasion. If people don’t believe in you, they won’t believe in what you’re promoting.

In this chapter, you’ll apply what you’ve learned so far about writing to the unique challenges of persuasive messages. You’ll explore two types of persuasive messages: persuasive business messages (those that try to convince audiences to approve new projects, enter into business partnerships, and so on) and marketing and sales messages (those that try to convince audiences to consider and then purchase products and services).

Using the Three-Step Writing Process for Persuasive Messages

Whether you’re convincing your boss to open a new office in Europe or encouraging potential customers to try your products, you’ll use many of the same techniques of persuasion— the attempt to change an audience’s attitudes, beliefs, or actions.2 Because persuasive messages ask audiences to give something of value (money in exchange for a product, for example) or take substantial action (such as changing a corporate policy), they are more challenging to write than routine messages. Successful professionals understand that persuasion is not about trickery or getting people to act against their own best interests; it’s about letting audiences know they have choices and presenting your offering in the best possible light.3

1 LEARNING OBJECTIVE

Apply the three-step writing process to persuasive messages.

Persuasion is the attempt to change someone’s attitudes, beliefs, or actions.

Step 1: Planning Persuasive Messages

In today’s information-saturated business environment, having a great idea or a great product is no longer enough. Every day, untold numbers of good ideas go unnoticed and good products go unsold simply because the messages meant to promote them aren’t compelling enough to be heard above the competitive noise. Creating successful persuasive messages in these challenging situations demands careful attention to all four tasks in the planning step, starting with an insightful analysis of your purpose and your audience.

Analyzing the Situation

In defining your purpose, make sure you’re clear about what you really hope to achieve. Suppose you want to persuade company executives to support a particular research project. But what does “support” mean? Do you want them to pat you on the back and wish you well? Or do you want them to give you a staff of five researchers and a $1 million annual budget?

The best persuasive messages are closely connected to your audience’s desires and interests (see Figure 9.1).4 Consider these important questions: Who is my audience? What are my audience members’ needs? What do I want them to do? How might they resist? Are there alternative positions I need to examine? What does the decision maker consider to be the most important issue? How might the organization’s culture influence my strategy?

Having a great idea or a great product is not enough; you need to be able to convince others of its merits.

Clarifying your purpose is an essential step with persuasive messages.

The main idea of “choose TD Ameritrade” is

echoed from the webpage tab, through the introductory text, and down to the specific details.

The headline and introductory paragraph

address universal concerns among investors.

These six supporting points—each of which reflects a key audience need—back up the top-level message of “A better way to invest.”

Figure 9.1 Appealing to Audience Needs

On this expertly written and designed webpage, TD Ameritrade echoes the concerns that individual investors are likely to have when selecting a stockbroker. Notice how well the writing moves the reader from the highlevel message to six individual supporting points—each of which is a major audience needs—and then on to more detailed information. The clean, focused design is equally effective and works in close harmony with the text. The layout guides the reader’s eye from the upper left corner, downward to the six key support points, and then across to the right for additional layers of detail.

An endorsement from a well-known source boosts the credibility of the company’s promotional message.

Each of the six supporting points is presented at three levels of detail: (1) the short message of the button labels at the far left, (2) a short paragraph with a headline that echoes audience needs, and

(3) additional pages (accessed via the link) with full details.

Demographics include characteristics such as age, gender, occupation, income, and education.

Psychographics include characteristics such as personality, attitudes, and lifestyle.

To understand and categorize audience needs, you can refer to specific information, such as demographics (the age, gender, occupation, income, education, and other quantifiable characteristics of the people you’re trying to persuade) and psychographics (personality, attitudes, lifestyle, and other psychological characteristics). When analyzing your audiences, take into account their cultural expectations and practices so that you don’t undermine your persuasive message by using an inappropriate appeal or by organizing your message in a way that seems unfamiliar or uncomfortable to your readers.

If you aim to change someone’s attitudes, beliefs, or actions, it is vital to understand his or her motivation—the combination of forces that drive people to satisfy their needs. Table 9.1 lists some of the needs that psychologists have identified or suggested as being important in influencing human motivation. Obviously, the more closely a persuasive message aligns with a recipient’s existing motivation, the more effective the message is likely to be. For example, if you try to persuade consumers to purchase a product on the basis of its fashion appeal, that message will connect with consumers who are motivated by a desire to

Basic physiological requirements: The needs for food, water, sleep, oxygen, and other essentials

Everyone has these needs, but the degree of attention an individual gives to them often depends on whether the needs are being met; for instance, an advertisement for sleeping pills will have greater appeal to someone suffering from insomnia than to someone who has no problem sleeping.

Helping others: The need to believe that one is making a difference in the lives of other people

This need is the central motivation in fundraising messages and other appeals to charity.

Step 2: Writing Persuasive Messages

Encourage a positive response to your persuasive messages by (1) using positive and polite language, (2) understanding and respecting cultural differences, (3) being sensitive to organizational cultures, and (4) taking steps to establish your credibility.

Positive language usually happens naturally with persuasive messages because you’re promoting an idea or product you believe in. However, take care not to inadvertently insult your readers by implying that they’ve made poor choices in the past and that you’re here to save them from their misguided ways.

Be sure to understand cultural expectations as well. For example, a message that seems forthright and direct in a low-context culture might seem brash and intrusive in a highcontext culture.

Just as social culture affects the success of a persuasive message, so too does the culture within an organization. For instance, some organizations handle disagreement and conflict in an indirect, behind-the-scenes way, whereas others accept and even encourage open discussion and sharing of differing viewpoints.

Finally, if you are trying to persuade a skeptical or hostile audience, you must convince them you know what you’re talking about and that you’re not trying to mislead them. Use these techniques:

■Use simple language to avoid suspicions of fantastic claims and emotional manipulation.

■Provide objective evidence for the claims and promises you make.

■Identify your sources, especially if your audience already respects those sources.

■Establish common ground by emphasizing beliefs, attitudes, and background experiences you have in common with the audience.

Organizational culture can influence persuasion as much as social culture.

Audiences often respond unfavorably to over-the-top language,

so keep your writing simple and straightforward.