When running any business, there will inevitably be a time when you need to ask a client for permission for something, whether it's to use their name as a reference or to bill them for a service. These letters are always tricky, get it wrong and your client will be able to avoid taking action on your request, get it right and you'll be able to reap the rewards of success (or so I'm told!).
I had one such occasion recently and thought it may be of use to share my experience/findings with others. Take a look at these two emails (semi-fake), one got what it was after, the other not. Once you've read them, I'll explain why and how you should word something so you can get what you want (which is most likely money!).
Example Email 1
John,
As the system has been in place for a number of months, I feel it is important that we have a support agreement put in place to avoid any unexpected invoices.
As previously discussed, we recommend an initial support level of 10 hours per month, please let me know if you have any objections to this.
Regards,
Tim
Example Email 2
John,
Now the system has been in place for number of months, I would like to implement the SLA as previously discussed.
If you have any concerns with the SLA being 10 hours a month, please let me know by Friday 31stAugust.
Regards,
Tim
It should be fairly obvious which one got what it was after but incase it isn't, the second email got what it was after (an SLA of 10 hours a month) but why?
Lets look at the two emails in more detail:
As the system has been in place for a number of months, I feel it is important that we have a support agreement put in place to avoid any unexpected invoices.
Does the reader really care what you feel? Unlikely. Do they care about avoiding unexpected invoices? Most likely yes but would they be worse off paying the odd (semi) unexpected email? Probably not as if you're an ethical company you'd keep them up to date with their time usage at any time...
As previously discussed, we recommend an initial support level of 10 hours per month, please let me know if you have any objections to this.
This first call-to-action required the reader's input for something, if (and this is most likely the case) your reader is either a business owner or executive, their motive to respond is almost nill as it's unlikely they're going to want to respond to your request just so they can give you money.
You may also notice that there's no penalty to this first request, it's open ended i.e. if the reader doesn't do anything, he's no worse off -in fact, he's actually better off!
Now lets look at the second email:
Now the system has been in place for number of months, I would like to implement the SLA as previously discussed.
Although similar in wording and still expressing what you would like to happen, you're not over complicating the issue and remaining factual.
If you have any concerns with the SLA being 10 hours a month, please let me know by Friday 31stAugust.
Notice that this time, the call-to-action is reversed, instead of asking for action to do something, you're asking the user to action something if he doesn't want it to happen? This may only read like a small difference, but it's a massive difference from your POV.
The second thing to notice is the deadline (or penalty) -this time, if the reader doesn't respond by the given deadline, the action will go on regardless of whether they have given their input.
So there you have it, two ways of writing what looks like the same email but with two very different results, just remember, next time you want something, tell your client it'll happen if they don't do anything -I'm sure you'll get more success!