How to Write a Letter of Appreciation

There are many reasons for writing a letter of appreciation, whether it be to a potential employer for an interview, a relative for hospitality or to a friend for support. Whatever the reason, it's important to express how grateful you are, and if you follow these steps, you can create a letter that lets the recipient know what her actions meant to you.

Difficulty:

Moderate

Instructions

1. Write your letter in a timely fashion. Timing is everything and that's true of writing a letter of appreciation. The person you're writing to took time out of his busy life to help you and you shouldn't wait until months later to let him know how much you appreciated his help.

2. Dig deep inside for a heartfelt letter. Your letter of appreciation will sound the most honest when you use your true feelings. The tone of sincerity, honesty and gratitude will shine through in your letter if you write as if you're speaking directly to the recipient.

3. Choose the correct medium. When you write a letter of appreciation to a friend or relative for something more personal, use stationery and hand write the letter. If the letter is business-related, use letterhead and type it instead.

4. Stick to the point of the letter. State up front your reason for thanking the recipient. With a personal letter, you can flesh it out a bit, but when writing a business appreciation letter, try to be as concise as possible.

5. Proofread. It doesn't matter if your letter of appreciation is personal or business, because you have to proofread both for spelling, grammatical or typographical errors. Leaving errors in makes the recipient feel like you didn't care enough to write the letter correctly or that you aren't qualified for a position.

Tips & Warnings

• When writing a business letter of appreciation, make sure that you address it to the correct person, use the correct title and spell the addressee's name correctly.

• Use a thesaurus, either online or hardcopy, to find more creative words to use or to avoid overuse.