Tips for Writing Effective Emails
As businesses move to all-electronic record-keeping, so too do they move to all-electronic communications for all other business matters. Email and electronic documents, sent as attachments to emails, move from office to office or travel around the world nearly instantaneously---eclipsing the slogan regarding information that "absolutely, positively" has to be at its destination overnight.
Email has morphed from simple "chit-chat" messages to accepted, formal business communications. Services and products are bought and sold in this virtual medium, often now without the two parties ever meeting each other. In some cases, the email might actually be the product being purchased (in the guise of business guidance, advice, recommendation, or other forms of consultation that are amenable to being handled textually).
Another outlet for all-electronic communications is distance or "virtual" education. Most colleges, universities, and other technical/trade schools now offer some or all of their educational courses as "online classes." Educators conduct classes using Internet- and web-based "classrooms" (hosted by the school itself or through a web-based facilitating service). Students participate in class by entering chat rooms for real-time discussions, logging onto and posting to blogs, and sending emails to deliver completed assignments (in the form of a document attached to the email).
As increasingly more business and education are conducted electronically, the task of "writing an email" now takes on a new importance. Whereas it used to be that "clothes make the man" (when you "dressed to impress" employers or clients), now "words make the man" (so that what you write is the virtual yardstick by which you are measured). If you haven't already been working on improving your written communication skills, then now is certainly the time to address it in earnest. To get you started, here are 10 tips to help you to write and send emails that reflect who you are and deliver your message efficiently and effectively.
1. Be Proactive
When sending email to a new contact, check beforehand to determine if your email address needs to be "approved" so that the receiving email system will accept your email. You may have to submit your email address as part of an online registration process. (Keep this in mind if you change Internet Service Providers. You will need to have your new address approved or registered.) Finding out that your email has been sitting in a "spam" folder for three days is not a good way to start your association with a new client or course instructor. Be sure to do likewise, and have the recipient's email address approved or pre-entered into your email address book.
2. Grammar Matters
It is never in poor taste to write an email that uses good grammar, proper punctuation, and is written in complete sentences. This is most true for emails that represent "first contact" with a client, a prospective business associate, a professor, or new classmate. Whether you are selling a service or a product, conducting business, or are discussing a classroom assignment with your instructor, the email recipient is going to judge you not only by what you write, but also by how you write. If you don't have good grammar skills, then pick up some version of Writing for Dummies (or a self-help grammar primer) and spend a couple of quality hours refreshing those faded memories of subjects, predicates, and prepositional phrases. And it needs to be said: Run spellcheck before you hit the Send button. Better yet, adjust your email preference settings so that spellcheck is automatically run before the email is sent.
3. Be Professional
If you wouldn't include it in a formal business letter, then don't include it in your email. Don't presume to commence a business/educational relationship with the kind of informality that is best relegated to chatty emails between friends. Avoid using "txt msg" shorthands. You might understand the multi-letter abbreviation, but will the recipient? On the other hand, steer clear of lengthy explanations and overly long emails. Busy people tend to skim emails first to determine if the email requires immediate attention, so be specific. If you find that you are having difficulty in distilling the matter into a few cohesive three-sentence paragraphs, then consider ditching the email and picking up the phone. It just may be one of those times when only a real-time conversation will do. (But don't delete the email text! Use it as crib notes for conducting your telephone call.)
When you send an email that requires a reply, state it plainly and consider offsetting the request in bold so that it is easily visualized (see also Tip #7 and Tip #10). And do yourself a favor: Set your email options to "include original email in reply" so that swapped emails maintain the whole sequence of the discussion. When Jake shoots back an email later in the afternoon that reads, "Great! I'll plan on seeing you then" you won't blank out on whether "then" is 30 minutes from now or this coming Thursday.
4. Be Adult
Emoticons (the many iterations of the ubiquitous "smiley face"), animated graphics, background pictures and designs ("stationery" options), unusual fonts, and colors are great for sending newsy letters to Cousin Caitlin. For professional emails, "plain" is best. Black or blue font, 10pt or 12pt, and any one of the three or four most commonly used fonts (such as Times New Roman, Arial, Courier, Comic Sans MS) are appropriate and easy to read. Most businesses, schools, and even individuals have sophisticated anti-virus programs and one or more firewalls that may interpret unusual types of email layouts as suspicious and shunt your email to a spam folder or block it, thus never delivering it to the recipient.
5. Forget Fancy Formatting
Emails that are heavily formatted through use of tabs, tables, numbered or bulleted lists, or text that contains imports from other programs such as Excel may look great on your computer screen, but may not look at all like what you see when the recipient opens your email. Formatting can get clobbered and turn your email into a jumble of two-word lines, and odd pieces of text "floating" around the email text pane. If you need to send text that contains any kind of special formatting or includes imports from Excel or other programs, then you are better off sending it as an attached document to your email. If you don't have the option to send an attachment, then send a sample email to someone you know, preferably someone who uses a different Internet service provider, and ask for a report on how the body of the email is displayed on his/her computer screen.
6. Sending Large or Multiple Files? Ask First!
It isn't unusual for a business to limit the size of incoming emails that it will accept. This means that if you need to send one large document, multiple files, graphics, or audio/video files, the total size of your outgoing email may exceed the size that the incoming email service will accept. Rather than assuming that your multi-color, 100-page proposal, with graphics, bar graphs, and spreadsheets will make to the recipient's inbox without a hitch, check to make sure that there aren't any email size restrictions. If there's no way to pre-determine that your proposal will go through, consider a fall-back. Upload the proposal as a zip file to your website or use an FTP (File Transfer Protocol) service and send the intended recipient the appropriate link or access information in the same or a follow-up email.
7. Write Subject Lines That Are On-Point
Your email is more likely to get the attention that it needs if the Subject line is concise and on-point (directly related to the subject matter in the email). It is likely that only five or six words will be visible in the recipient's email inbox viewing pane, so choose your words carefully. Avoid using acronyms (or other text-messaging shorthands) unless you are confident that the recipient will understand them. If the overall topic of the email morphs during two or more email swaps, then think about revising the Subject line, especially if the email becomes personal or conversational (that is, no longer relevant to the original topic of the email). For emails that have been passed back and forth multiple times, consider deleting "Re:Re:Re:" in front of the subject line. Do likewise for important emails that have been forwarded and delete "FW:" before you send it. While we're in the neighborhood, only mark emails "Priority" (or "Urgent") if you really mean it (consider the little boy who cried "Wolf").
8. Use Prudence and Discretion When Forwarding Emails
Managing emails can take on a life of its own, and many people are now faced with carving out increasingly more time to read and respond to emails as part of their daily schedule. Enterprising business consultants are now offering "Email Management" coaching sessions, but you don't have to pay for a pricey seminar to understand that you just don't have time to waste on opening "forwarded" emails that turn out to be jokes or other electronic whimsy that's on its fourth circuit around the office. For some people, just seeing "FW:" in the subject line of an email is enough to cause it to be summarily ignored (and likely deleted). If an email is important enough that it must or should be forwarded, then do so---but update the subject line so that the recipient will be most likely to open the email (see also Tip #7). Also consider deleting the layers of "To:" and "From:" email addresses that may appear so that you forward only the original email.
9. Resist the Temptation to Write or Reply to "Flame" Emails
When tempers flare the last thing you should do is launch an email attack. If your temper ignited after reading an incoming email, then resist the urge to fire off a red-hot reply. Here's a tip offered to me by a respected colleague: "If you need to criticize somebody, or squash somebody, or you want to announce a 'just because I said so' decision, then do it by telephone or in person." Sage advice indeed. Emails are inanimate and cannot convey voice tones or inflections that are so vital when initiating or engaging in a confrontational discussion. Whenever possible, these types of conversations are best held in person so that the other person can not only hear your voice, but also read your body language (a sometimes crucial subtlety that is lost during a phone call). It's easy to avoid having your real message misunderstood: Let your temper cool for at least 10 minutes. Then pick up the phone, walk down the hall and into his/her office, or schedule a face-to-face meeting for a later date.
10. Know When To Stop Replying
Don't let "replying to the reply" become an obsession. When you sense that the issue has been thoroughly discussed and that you require no input from the other party, end your final email with an obvious statement to that effect: "Looks like we're in agreement on this. No need to reply unless there is an issue that should be discussed further." If appropriate, close your email with a friendly good-bye. When you are the party who receives the "No need to reply" closing email, honor that and resist the urge to "get in the last word."
As emails become increasingly more accepted as "the voice of doing business" it is important that your emails reflect your work quality, your work ethic, and, most importantly, you. Writing emails that convey your message, concisely and correctly, will help to guarantee that your emails will get the attention they deserve. In turn, you will get the attention that you deserve. In an all-electronic world, your work may very well depend on your words. Use them wisely.
Co-author Jan K., The Proofer is a freelance copyeditor and proofreader. Visit Jan’s Portal (http://www.jansportal.com) for more information about Jan's free crafts, recipes, tutorials, other resource sites, and free content articles, as well as Jan’s business services. Be sure to visit Mom's Break (http://www.momsbreak.com/) for free printable crafts and projects. © Copyright 2005 to present. All rights reserved.
Co-author Rick Subber, retired, was a planning and market research manager for The Morning Call, based in Allentown, PA. He is now an adjunct faculty member at Moravian College, teaching management, marketing, and other related business skills. Visit Rick’s website at www.rsubber.com.