Personalise - Using person's name in a sales letter will give you greatest success. It's feasible to address sales letters to - "Dear Transport Manager" or "Dear Friend" or "Dear Sir or Madam" or no salutation at all. However this lessens your chances of getting a response.

You must have a good headline - You've got to grab reader's attention as quickly as possible. There must be a reason for them to read on. The same rules apply that you'd use in your advertising or your brochure; you need to start with words such as - "How to" or "Discover" or "The Secrets of"

Start with an anecdote - Introduce your message with a short relevant story. For example, you might use something like this if you were introducing a management training program - "Seventy percent of employees don't leave their job they leave their manager" You'd then provide supportive statistics and give details on cost of staff turnover. You would then go on to show how you could reduce these costs and improve productivity through your training program

Lots of "You" and no "I" or "We" - Make each letter sound like you're speaking to that individual rather than to a group of people

It needs to tell reader what's in it for them - Tell them how they will personally benefit, how their business will benefit and/or how their problem will be resolved

Be believable - Don't make "fantastic" claims for your product or service - your letter has to be credible

It does, however, help to build brand recognition and keeps your name in front of your existing and potential customers. People are also more likely to read a newsletter than a sales letter because they see it as less threatening.

A newsletter lets customer know that:

You are an expert in your field You are prepared to give them lots of free advice, tips and ideas You have some new products or services You have a sale or a promotion coming up You understand customer's industry and their problems You are a human organisation with lots of lovely people You are an organisation to be trusted You provide great customer service to other organisations

You can use your newsletter to build a relationship with your customer and you can also use it as a selling tool.