Email is an essential tool for collaboration and communication. In simple terms, Email is simply communicating with the written word. When you send a mail, you are representing yourself, your business unit and your company, to a wide range of internal and external recipients. So, it is very important that an email is being understood, for providing a positive impression and more importantly for business; credible and professional.
Email is now a mainstream business communication platform. Here are some tips for writing/drafting an effective email. Follow these simple steps to make accurate, timely and positive impressions on the reader of the mail.
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Subject line: The subject line should be clear and specific. It is the subject that determines whether the email will be read or not. It should encourage the reader to open and read the email. It is very essential to compose a meaningful subject line. An informative subject line saves the recipient’s time and ensures your emails are prioritized by the reader. Do not use all caps or all small case, it can lend to the impression you may be spammer. Try to keep it short and self explanatory.
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Addressing: Always use the person’s name in the salutation. It’s pretty common to use a person’s first name, even when contacting someone for the first time, but use your own judgment regarding when it’s appropriate to be formal or informal.
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Have a great opening: First impressions are important. Your first one or two sentences dictate whether your message gets read or deleted. Make your opening words count. Use short sentences and simple words.
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To the point: Avoid long paragraphs. Keep sentences short. Use bullets for lists. Use subtitles to break up long emails. Use strong active verbs. Avoid jargon and acronyms. Your chances of getting a quick response will vastly improve when you keep your emails brief.
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Highlight actions and key points: Underlining, highlighting or bold to help people concentrate on the key points is a very good practice. You can also highlight action items and important dates that are important.
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Respect privacy in group emails: When you are sending mails to a group, try to maintain the privacy of the recipient. Use BCC field when emailing a group of contacts who do not personally know each other. Use CC field when there are few individuals/organizations involved in a discussion.
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Formatting: Formatting an email is very necessary to be sure that 90% of the people you’re emailing your message to, can see it properly. There are several important points to be considered while formatting an email. 1. Line length, this is considered to be the most important element when formatting. It’s the main cause of the silly looking email. 2. Make sure your paragraphs are short, maybe around five or six lines, anything longer will take up too much space and the reader will most likely find it very difficult to read. 3. Use fixed width fonts to display emails.
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Attachments: E-mail is primarily a text based system. However there are times it is essential to receive or send other types of information (e.g. programs, pictures, word documents, spreadsheets etc). E-mail is like sending a letter and an attachment is like sending a package by UPS. When you send an attachment make sure the file you are sending is in a format that can be read by the person on the other end. Never send large attachments. If the files are very large, compress them to make it smaller.
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Down Edit Your Replies: when you hit reply for a received mail, the email is attached with the previous email information which may be no longer important. Removing parts of the previous email that no longer apply to your response including email headers and signature files removes the mess. In addition, by making the effort to reply point by point keeps the conversation on track.
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Signatures: Signatures can be almost anything: funny, interesting, quotations, stock quotes, programs, empty space, your address, ASCII art… but they should always also be brief. Keep your signature files to not more than 5-6 lines. Limit your signature to your Web site link, company name, and slogan/offer or phone number. Include a link to your site (if you have any) where the recipient can get all your contact information from A-Z.
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Take a second look: Re-read your emails before you send them. Always check for spelling and grammar, so that the email can be easily understood by the recipient.
