Audience: The specific group to whom you are directing your essay

Who will most benefit from reading your evaluation? Imagine one specific person or group of people and direct your paper to that audience.

1. The hiring and training of service personnel at Bennigan’s needs a complete overhaul.

2. If the employees of Bennigan’s want to get better tips, there are several areas they could concentrate on.

3. You have to try the food at Bennigan’s!

4. If Bennigan’s wants to continue to attract customers, it is going to have to undergo a massive atmosphere overhaul.

· Who is your target audience? (Customers (narrow); Corporate; Managers; Employees?) Be as specific as possible.

Purpose: Reason for writing the essay

What do you want your target audience to think, know or do? State this clearly in your thesis!

*All main points should tie to purpose/audience!

Atmosphere issues:

· Audience: Corporate

· Purpose: Make restaurant a more comfortable drinking place

1. If customers are temperature–happy, they will stay longer and drink more.

2. If customers can hear one another, they will stay longer to talk and drink more.

3. The restaurant is not decorated in an Irish style, nor is the food Irish, which doesn’t match the name of the place.

4. If the seating were more comfortable, customers would relax and stay longer, thereby consuming more expensive alcoholic beverages.

· What do I want my target audience to think, know, or do after reading my paper?

Focused Thesis and Topic Sentences

1. Create a thesis that addresses audience, is about your specific area of responsibility, and clearly states think, know, or do.

Thesis= Your area of responsibility + claim (tailored to audience; suggesting specific purpose)

Ex: The managers at Bennigan’s need to seriously rework their hiring and training practices.

2. Create topic sentences that are tailored to your target audience and reflect your purpose.

a. The people who are hired by Bennigan’s have serious hygiene issues.

b. Not only do the employees need training in personal care, but it appears that the main criterion for being hired by Bennigan’s is an inability to smile (no doubt a reflection of not being asked out for years due to issues with personal cleanliness).

c. Finally, even more frustrating than the sights and smells of unhappy, hygienically–challenged help, the staff is clearly lacking in training in terms of efficiency, forcing the customer to be trapped with this unpleasantness for much longer than necessary.

Samples from Student Papers

Thesis: “The OWNER needs to concentrate more on this restaurant’s atmosphere to make the customers feel welcome when they arrive.”

Point 1: “Although the restaurant is decorated tastefully, it still needs to be extended in its size to make customers more comfortable.”

2: “Pho Hoa is not only small, but it is also noisy.”

3: “Moreover, there is one more thing that the OWNER needs to change, which is the air conditioning system and the exhausted fan, which do not work well.”

Sentence from conclusion: “Consequently, the OWNER should try being a customer at least once to evaluate his or her own restaurant.”

Thesis: “After eating their famous noodle soup bowls, I recognized that the EMPLOYEES at Pho Hoa Restaurant need to improve service to their customers.”

Point 2: “In addition, I realized that their attentiveness to their customers also needs to be improved because they didn’t have enough customer care, even though there were only six people in the restaurant[…].”

Point 3: “The attitude of the employees in the restaurant needs to be improved when greeting their customers and showing their solicitude to whomever they serve.”