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The 11-Step Guide to Writing a Thank-You Letter

For many, it’s the season of Thanksgiving—but do you ever have difficulty putting your gratitude into words? You can always send a cute thank-you video (like this one with minions) or give a public shout-out on social media, but there’s something extra special about a personally crafted written expression of appreciation.

I recently got married, so I have had lots—and lots—of practice putting my gratitude into words. Whether you’re basking in appreciation for the help or gifts you’ve received, or you simply want to recognize someone you care about by acknowledging the good work they’re doing, learning how to write a thank-you letter is an important skill. Here are some essential steps to follow while writing a thank-you letter.

1. Don’t put it off.

When writing thank-you letters, time is of the essence. For one thing, it’s courteous to send a prompt reply to acknowledge a gift, as this lets the giver know that you have, indeed, received it. You should generally respond within two weeks of receiving the gift.

Another reason to get writing is that it’s easier for you—and less stressful! Write while the memory of unwrapping the orange squeezer from Uncle Chester is fresh in your mind. But before you pick up a pen, here are a couple of things to consider.

2. Mind your Ps and Qs.

Even in the age of technology, there’s a certain degree of etiquette involved when issuing recognition for good deeds. Though the idea of “etiquette” may seem old-fashioned, it simply refers to the accepted ways to treat someone politely, making them feel that they are respected and considered.

For instance, you need to put some effort into your “thank you.” While a thank-you text message may seem convenient, a quick “Tx 4 the stuff. U R awsum” might not do justice to the time, money, and energy spent by the recipient. One reason that people write thank-you notes (often by hand) to their wedding guests is to expend personal energy in response to the generosity of others. That being said, thank-you letters don’t necessarily have to be handwritten—but they do have to be thoughtful and sincere.

3. Choose your medium.

Aside from the thank-you etiquette of weddings, baby showers, and other gift-amassing events that call for handwritten thank-you notes, you should also think about the options you have for sending your thanks in everyday situations.

Will you send a brief Facebook message or email to someone too busy to check their physical mailbox? How about choosing pretty, purple stationery replete with images of cats for a letter to your kind granny? You’ll want to consider the personality and lifestyle of your recipient, matching their communication preference with the format of your thank-you letter.

If you have elegant penmanship (or really clear block lettering), consider choosing material forms of communication, as this adds a personal touch. You can even type your letter and print it out. It’s especially nice for someone living abroad or for those confined to their homes to receive a handwritten thank-you letter. Once you’ve chosen your medium, you’re ready to start writing your thank-you letter!

4. Fill in the blanks (in your own unique way).

Now it’s time to start composing. Your letter should follow this basic structure:

  1. Salutation (e.g., Dear ______)
  2. Thank you (e.g., Thank you for the ______)
  3. Appreciation (e.g., It was so kind of you to ______; we appreciate your ______; we plan to use the ______ for ______)
  4. Closing (e.g., We hope to see you ______; thanks again for ______)
  5. Signature (e.g., Love, ______)

Keep in mind that this is an informal style of writing, so you should keep your tone warm and personal. Your thank-you letter should also be fairly concise and straightforward—there’s no need for over-the-top language or a parade through the streets.

5. Salute your recipient (appropriately)!

When writing your thank-you letter, the first thing you have to tackle is your salutation. You don’t have to be super formal, but you should also show respect. Suit your opening salutation to the kind of relationship you have with the recipient. For instance, you wouldn’t refer to your granny as “Mrs. Elouise Margaret Giggery” when you’re thanking her for the cookies she sent (“Dear Granny” would suffice), but you don’t want to offend your college dean with the informal salutation “Hey bud!” Only use first names, nicknames, or informal titles if you have a close relationship with the addressee.

6. Say the magic word.

And no, I don’t mean “please”! This is where you list your thank-yous, whether it’s for the recipient’s qualities, gifts given, or services rendered. Many people struggle with how to say thank you, but it’s really more important that you say it. Simplicity is often the best way to go.

For items received, one tip is to be specific with your description (e.g., the polka dot-covered orange squeezer or the chocolate chip cookies), unless you’re thanking someone for money. Some people consider it gauche to say, “Thank you for your cheque of $500 USD.” Instead of referring to money as “cash” or “moolah,” use a more polite term such as “generous gift.”

Also, keep in mind that gift-givers typically like to know how you plan to use their donation. If you’re writing to thank someone for their actions, remember that people love to be appreciated.

7. Offer your appreciation (even if you didn’t love the paperweights from Aunt Myrtle).

Ever heard the phrase “It’s the thought that counts”? Our materialistic society is sometimes more concerned with the contents of the gift received than the thoughtfulness (or attempted thoughtfulness) of the giver. It might be true that the sparkly purple paperweights from Aunt Myrtle weren’t at the top of your wish list, but she still took some trouble and expense for your benefit.

The bottom line is that you should explain why the gift is important to you—even if it’s not something you would have purchased for yourself. Showing appreciation is essential to maintaining healthy relationships—and to writing a sincere thank-you letter.

8. Add a line to stay in touch.

Aside from expressing your appreciation, take a moment to share some news or catch up with the recipient before wrapping up your note of thanks. For example, you might ask how your granny is enjoying her new oven (which produced such fantastic cookies!), or you might mention how you plan to see your Aunt Myrtle in the New Year. Your thank-you is a nice way to remind someone that you haven’t forgotten them and they’re still a part of your life.

9. Reiterate your gratitude.

This step isn’t totally necessary, but it doesn’t hurt to say “Thanks again.” It wraps up the note with a reminder of your gratitude.

10. Sign your John Hancock.

Whether you’re sending an email, a postcard, or a message by carrier pigeon, don’t forget to sign your name. If possible, use your handwritten signature. You should also add a closing line such as “Sincerely,” “Warmest regards,” or “With all my/our love”—which, again, depends on how well you know the addressee.

11. One final tip . . .

Whatever reason you’re writing a thank you, remember to be sincere. Even if you didn’t get the gift that you expected or the recipient didn’t do all you’d hoped they would, show gratitude for what they did do. It’s more important to write from the heart than to write eloquently.

Conclusion

Writing a thank-you letter is a meaningful social practice and an opportunity to show that you care. It’s nice to know that someone’s thinking of you, and that’s what thank-you letters are all about. After all, kindness never goes out of style.

The Comic Touch: How to Be Funny in Your Writing

Airplanes. Ben Affleck making a comeback after Gigli. Space travel. Women not just wearing—but totally rocking—pants on a regular basis. Justin Timberlake being taken seriously as an actor.

These are all things that people once thought highly unlikely, and maybe even impossible, yet they’re all totally accepted facts today.

The lesson here? There’s no such thing as impossible. If you put your mind to it and are willing to do the work, then gosh dang it, you can learn how to be funny.

But before we get into the how of writing humor, I’d like to delve into the why. The suspense of waiting for the how may very well kill you, I know, but what can I say? I’m a risk taker.

What are the benefits of writing humor into your story?

You may be wondering why incorporating humor into fiction and other types of creative writing is even important. You may think that learning how to be funny is secondary to learning how to tell compelling, dramatic stories.

The truth is, writing humor is important precisely because it helps create compelling and dramatic stories. Allow me to break that down into five easily digestible points that are sure to provide you with your daily dose of figurative fiber:

1. Humor can be used to give us a break from other more intense emotions.

You’ve surely heard the term “comic relief” tossed around before. Comic relief occurs when a comic scene or character appears in an otherwise tragic or serious tale. It gives the audience or reader a break from the intensity of the rest of the story.

Shakespeare is big on comic relief. Considering that his tragedies—like King Lear, Romeo and Juliet, Hamlet, and Othello, to name a few—always conclude with the violent deaths of most of the characters, you can see how some laughs might ease the tension a bit before the imminent bloodshed.

2. Writing humor can be satiric—it can work to highlight the absurdity of a real issue.

Sometimes writing about reality can be a hefty task. Explicitly stating what’s wrong with the world, with society, with your parents, or with your less-than-complete sense of self is not always the most effective or entertaining way to communicate your message. Plus, some topics are taboo—and as fun as it is to say taboo, what this word means is that you’re not really supposed to talk about certain things. Cue satire.

Joseph Heller’s Catch-22 is an astonishing example of satire. Heller uses satire to highlight the absurdity, the illogicality, the painful contradictions, and the nonsensical confusion experienced by soldiers fighting in a world war, as well as the chaos behind the concept of war itself.

Another example of tackling a taboo subject with satire is Oscar Wilde’s hilarious play, The Importance of Being Earnest, which highlights the contradictions between appearances and reality in English society in the late 1800s. In Earnest, deviations from convention are the only ways to escape a world in which believing something is enough to make it true. In the play, this is seen in Algernon’s “Bunburying,” which is widely interpreted as a metaphor for homosexual activity (which was illegal at the time and landed Wilde himself in prison).

3. Writing humor can help create an honest connection between the reader and the narrator or character.

Just as we love the “class clown” in real life, we tend to love funny characters in books. These are the kinds of people who, if they actually existed, would make my grandmother smile wryly and say, “Oh, that one’s a character all right!” I love that woman.

A great example of using humor in writing to help the reader relate to the story is John Dies at the End, a comic horror novel by David Wong. A truly absurd book from start to finish, this comic and sardonic narrative lets the reader inside the mind of the narrator, David. We get a solid grasp of his sense of humor (complete with grammar jokes about apostrophes and dangling modifiers, I might add), but we also get the inside scoop on the intense experiences and feelings he’s having.

Considering that David has unwittingly contributed to the opening of a portal to other dimensions, complete with gods of chaos and squiggly, creepy creatures, you could say he’s going through a pretty tough time. The humor in this book also helps us fall in love with David’s partner in crime, John, who to our relief—spoiler alert—does not actually die at the end.

4. Humor can be used as a contrast to tragedy, making the poignancy of more difficult emotions hit the reader even harder.

Dave Eggers masters the contrast of comedy with tragedy in his semi-fictional memoir, A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius. This book is laugh-out-loud funny. It’s crawling with Eggers’ trademark wit and astute observations about the hilarity of everyday life. Filled with wild tangents and unconventional fourth-wall confrontations, this book is sure to keep most readers on their toes.

Did I mention both of Eggers’ parents die at the beginning of the book and that Eggers must then assume custody of his young brother? Eggers, with his fantastical blurring of fiction and reality, allows the reader to almost forget this. Then, quietly, he reminds us. The result? We’re momentarily heartbroken, only to be uplifted again by Eggers’ next wild tangent. While it may be either wildly pretentious or painfully ironic, the book’s title is quite accurate.

5. Writing humorously keeps the reader interested and engaged.

Even if humor serves no other purpose in your writing, know this—most people respect a good display of wit. Even if you don’t know how to be funny in real life, I suggest you learn how to be in your writing.

Clever writing is intelligent writing, and intelligent writing is respected and encourages engagement. Shakespeare reigns supreme in the wit department, and Wilde runs a close second. For more examples of wit that just won’t quit, I recommend checking out anything written by Jane Austen, J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit, Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, and J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone.

So there’s the why. Now where’s the how?

As promised, here is your guide to how to be funny in writing. Follow these steps, and you’ll surely be busting guts in no time at all:

1. Give up now.

If you haven’t figured out how to be funny on your own already, it’s not going to happen. What do you think I am, a wizard or something? Go on. Get outta here!

2. Wait, no! I was lying! Don’t go!

I was just doing something unexpected to try to catch you off guard. Did it work? Sometimes the element of surprise is enough to elicit a laugh when writing humor.

3. See what I did there? Aren’t I clever?

“Oh, the cleverness of me!” If it fits your story, making allusions to famous icons and events can put your jokes into context and help readers relate to you. Peter Pan is a go-to of mine, so you can’t have him, but anyone else is all yours. Another way to illicit a laugh is to hearken back to a previous point from your own story in a surprising way. Once you set up a world, weave together inside jokes that you share with your reader.

4. A false sense of grandeur can sometimes be funny, too. Trust me—I know.

Pretending that you know what you’re talking about is a sure way to get people to laugh at you, especially if you quite obviously don’t know what you’re talking about. Sure, it might not be the kind of laughter you’re after, but a laugh is a laugh, right?

5. Right. You wanted to learn how to be funny.

If you really want to learn how to be funny, you’re going to have to do a bit of work. Read some of the works mentioned above, and think about how humor is used in them (using my handy-dandy descriptions as a guide). Then, think about how you can incorporate humor into your own writing.

Make note of the jokes that made you laugh the hardest, and dissect them to really understand how they work before putting those mechanisms into practice.

Your jokes might not be gold at first, but in time, I’m sure you’ll find that you’re cracking jokes faster than my grandma cracks eggs for Sunday brunch. Have I mentioned yet today how much I love her?

 

12 Essay-Writing Hacks from a Professional Editor

As a professional editor, I’ve edited all kinds of documents, not the least of which are essays. I’ve seen it all—the good, the bad, and the ugly.

Look, it’s easy to write a bad essay when it’s due in less than 24 hours (we’ve all been there), but that doesn’t mean it’s difficult to write a good essay. To write a good essay, you just have to know what to look for to make weak writing stronger.

Simply looking is the number one job of a professional editor (outside of drinking coffee) because looking leads to discovering—and once you find your errors, improvement is just around the corner.

After editing over a million words, I’ve come to understand what makes a good essay and what makes a bad essay, and I have a few practical tips—essay hacks, if you will—for improving your own essay-writing skills.

1. Befriend your argument.

Make sure you know everything there is to know about your argument. That means you should understand exactly what it is you’re arguing and why. If your argument was an elevator pitch and you had to explain it to someone in just a minute or two, could you? If the answer is “No,” revisit the main point of your essay. Do more research to make sure you know the topic inside and out.

The reason you need to be prepared is that, if there’s any proof that can shoot your argument down, you not only need to shield those bullets but also to ricochet them back. Don’t just know your argument—befriend it. Find out its strengths and its weaknesses.

2. Challenge every idea.

If you have any questions about your topic, subject, or field, ask them as soon as you can. Hitting a snag later can stall progress on your essay, so if you can hit all the major weak points early on, you can avoid finding major flaws in your argument later.

Challenge anything that causes questions to sprout and play the devil’s advocate for your own argument. If you’ve identified these weaknesses before, now is the time to investigate further and begin to clarify anything that might still be fuzzy.

3. Select your sources carefully.

When selecting your sources, be picky. Don’t resort to using online sources just because they’re easily accessible. Try to use all kinds of different sources, but only if they’re current. Don’t pick a dusty old book from the library just to have a print source in your references list.

Choose current and relevant sources from trustworthy or notable scholars in the field. If your proof is questionable, your whole argument will fall apart, so choose your sources like you would an all-star team if you want to knock your essay out of the park.

4. Start writing early.

This is important: make sure you start writing early. Don’t put your essay off until the last minute. Do you know what’s waiting for you at the last minute? Regret and sadness.

Kickstart yourself now so you don’t kick yourself later. If you need to set an early deadline for yourself or split the essay writing into manageable chunks, do it. Just make sure you start early so you have time to solve any problems you run into later.

5. Organize for clarity.

The structure of your essay is every bit as important as the argument itself. If you have a flimsy structure, there’s no firm foundation to build the essay on; if there’s no firm foundation, your essay could collapse at any moment.

Focus on structuring your essay before you start writing. How will you arrange your argument and provide evidence in a cohesive and logical way? It’s better to answer that question earlier rather than later. Use transitions to ensure your argument flows logically from one point to the next.

6. Watch your tense and voice.

First, use the active voice when you write your essay (unless otherwise instructed). Second, avoid personal pronouns to maintain objectivity if need be (e.g., in scientific and other formal writing).

Third, you should write in the literary present, meaning that all actions performed in the text should be explained in the present tense rather than the past.

Finally, avoid using clichés. Since you want to present original thoughts, overused phrases need to be cut.

7. Explain everything clearly.

Any time you make a point, explain it clearly—even if you think it’s obvious. Your argument will be obvious to you (since you’ve befriended it), but it’s brand new to the reader. Your argument is meeting your reader for the first time, and like any new friends, they need introducing. If you fail to introduce them properly, things will get very confusing and awkward.

8. Be succinct.

Sentences should be straightforward, communicating one point at a time; cut all unnecessary words. You’ll also want to eliminate any repetition. It’s easy to say the same things over and over again in an essay, but doing so won’t strengthen your argument.

Cut unnecessary phrases and anything wordy or redundant, including phrases that don’t add information, such as “it should be pointed out that” or “due to the fact that.” Similarly, don’t ramble on about the same topic or go off on a tangent in the middle of your essay.

9. Avoid academese at all costs.

Try to keep things simple. While you shouldn’t talk down to your audience or explain every technical term, you should always be concise. Most importantly, don’t ever use words or phrases that you think will make you sound smarter.

It’s always best to be straightforward, so use the right vocabulary to say exactly what you want to say. It’s embarrassing if you try to use a fancy word only to find it doesn’t mean what you thought it meant.

10. Be aware of your word count.

Don’t go over your word count. Most markers will stop marking at the last word within the word count, so it’s crucial that you stay within it if you want to do well.

However, you also don’t want to stay severely lower than the word count provided. While you shouldn’t pad the essay by adding information that isn’t necessary to your argument or relevant to the topic at hand, you should get as close to the word count as possible by thoroughly exploring your topic and elaborating on your argument.

11. Carefully cite everything.

Unless you want to face a failing grade, academic probation, or even expulsion, you need to cite all of your sources. There are many types of plagiarism, but as long as you take good notes during your research and credit your sources, it’s easy to avoid plagiarism.

Your academic integrity is at stake here, so ensure that you are overly cautious in recording the necessary material. Be vigilant in confirming that you’ve documented everything fully and correctly.

12. Revise extensively.

Every good essay has been revised at least once, which means you, too, should tighten your writing. Comb through and ensure that everything is clear, consistent, and flows well. Once you’re happy with the content of your essay, you can sweat the small stuff, like grammar and spelling errors.

Even brilliant essays receive lower grades if simple mistakes are left in the document, so consider getting a second opinion and having an expert look over your writing for both form and content. At the very least, run a spell and grammar check. You’ll be so happy you did.

Conclusion

Essay writing doesn’t have to be hard. Anyone can write a good essay with the proper tools. These essay hacks are part of your toolkit, which you can use to improve your essay writing. Go from good to great by considering these tips and implementing them when writing your next essay.

If you would prefer a step-by-step guide for essay writing and want to improve your skills once and for all, you might want to think about taking a course to organize and write good essays every time.

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