it needs a comma
there's no colon, a comma comes after mrs smith
A comma is not required in the salutation of an editorial letter. You can use either a comma or a colon after the recipient's name. For example, "Dear Editor," or "Dear Editor:".
comma or colon Examples: Dear A n na, Dear Sirs:
In business letters, you should use a colon (:) if you use any punctuation. The new way is to have no punctuation after the greeting in business letters. But if you omit punctuation there, you also have to omit the comma after the closing. In personal letters, people use a comma after the greeting.
Dear Senator (last name): or Dear Senator:
Formal salutations are always followed by a colon. (Dear Sir Only in informatal writing do you use a comma. (Dear Sue,)
Traditionally, a colon for business letters and a comma for personal letters.
"Dear Captain Salazar" needs a colon.
It used to be considered correct to put a comma after the saltation as: Dear Sir, Nowadays the comma is often left out.
Dear Downy;
If you're writing a letter, after Dear Billy is should be a comma.
a comma