We have lost the art of good written communication

I’m not an advocate of going back to hand written letters (no thank you!) but the same level of care and customisation wouldn’t hurt our relationships with our clients. The problem exists, simply because we often bolt our company processes to ancient or poorly written standard letters, without properly vetting the content of our communication with our valued clients – we fall into the technology trap!

So my learning curve has been that the use of communication technology really needs an overhaul – ensure the following :

1. Look at what you are sending your clients – is it accurate ? is it enough? Is there any personality or customisation? Does it show care? (Or does it look like you just spat an irrelevant or contradictory standard letter to the client or tenant without any care?)

2. Ensure templates are well written (spelling checked!) Overhaul them and make sure they are great. If the Director of your company was one of your landlords, would you be happy for them to receive this? Make this process a collaboration to ensure the best possible templates are created.

3. Make sure that your team understand that they should customise and reflect conversations and instructions but adhere to the basic template and language.

4. Always ensure that client information and instructions are clearly file noted in your system to ensure that correspondence is never contradictory and your service remains personalised, to keep your clients happy.

5. THINK about who you are sending it to. I had a property manager in a previous role who sent an email to a Chinese client saying “I know where you are coming from”. The client quickly replied saying,“I’m not coming from anywhere, I live in China and have no plans to travel to Australia”. Her colloquialism was very confusing in this context.

6. PROOF READ everything before signing or sending – just to make sure!