Watch Your Words in Pitches

With email, it's easy to quickly assemble a query or letter of introduction and send it to a prospect or client. Unfortunately, it's too easy to get sloppy, even when you swear up one side of the street and down the other that you'd never be guilty of the offense. The strongest piece of marketing you have is whatever you've written that is sitting in front of someone. If it is unclear in structure, the buyer will think that all of your writing is. Someone isn't going to ignore the email, because they'll assume that to be a clearer indication of your work habits.

Also be aware of reader sensitivities. As an example, the phrase "very unique" is unlikely to bring in additional assignments, but for people who count the phrase as silly (there are no degrees of uniqueness), it could be the kiss of death. When the phone doesn't ring, you'll know it's them. No mafia don will ever pay such heed to omerta, the code of silence.

Take a moment before you hit send, run spell check, and then read over the message yourself. Maybe you think you've never had a problem, but you'll never know who was unimpressed and decided to pass.