5 Tips For Writing A Better Email
1. Keep Your Subject Line Short and Informative
Clearly, your goal in sending an email is to have it read. For that to happen, a busy person has to know what it’s about and why they should open it. Your subject line tells them that, or at least, it should.
Remember, since your goal is to have the recipient open your email, you don’t have to tell them everything in the subject line, just enough to get them to click. A few words describing your email’s content or your reason for writing will do. And here’s a hint, front-load the subject line with the most important words, i.e. not “I’d like to ask you about the quarterly report” but “Quarterly Report Question.” Some email programs limit the subject line, or what’s visible of it, to 40 characters or less. So don’t waste characters putting your name, your company, their name or their company in the subject line. Short but sweet equals short and seen.
On the other end of the spectrum, don’t leave your subject line blank. That tells your recipient nothing and is likely to get your email left unopened, or worse, suspected of being spam and deleted unread. Having Fwd: or Re: with nothing else in the subject line is similarly unhelpful.
If your recipient is familiar with status categories, or you think they’ll catch on quick, adding [Info], [Action], [Time Sens] or [Low Priority] to the beginning of your subject heading can help give them some insight into when is the best time to open and respond to your email.
2. Make Your Email Brief and Get Straight to the Point
It can be tempting to want to start an email with pleasantries, but when the email is for work, sometimes the nicest thing you can do is get straight to the point. No one likes to read a long email, especially when there are so many preferable things we can be doing with our time. Help your reader by using the fewest words possible to get your point across. And also, make your main point or points early and use your first sentence or two to give an overview of what’s to come. There’s no guarantee your reader will make it to the end, but if they know what’s at the end – and that it’s important, or relevant – you’ve got a better shot.
If your email has a series of questions, consider using bullet points to make the email easy to navigate at a glance. The reader’s eye will then be drawn to the part of the email requiring a response, which should help you get what you want. When possible, formulate your questions so that they can be answered with short answers like “yes” and “no”. This will increase the likelihood of you getting a speedy and helpful reply.
Also, indicate how time-sensitive your request is. This respects your email receiver’s ability to prioritize. It also gives them a timeframe, which can act to motivate them to reply much like a deadline would. Think about it, if you ask for a response by next week, it gives them time to reply when convenient, but also doesn’t leave it open ended so that they think it’s okay to reply a month from now. When you’re concise and specific, everybody wins.
3. Be Personal and Conversational
When emails are sent to one hundred people, or even just to five people, they often get less attention. Sometimes mass emails don’t even get read. If the reader sees there are many people on the list of recipients, they might figure they’re not that necessary as a reader. Someone else will respond. If that’s not true and they are necessary as a reader, let them know that. Leave off recipients that don’t need to be included, use the recipients name at the start of your message, and if you are sending a bona fide mass email, consider using a mail merge program to fake the personal touch and make your email more likely to get read.
In a related vein, it’s acceptable for business emails to use a tone that is less formal than a normal business letter. Writing in a conversational tone is another way of making your email feel more personal. However, just be careful not to make your tone too casual or too familiar. One helpful guideline is to still write in proper business English as much as possible. You can be friendly – “Hey Dave, missed you at the meeting…” instead of “Dear Dave,” – without resorting to slang or abbreviations.
Also, don’t Reply All unless it’s really necessary. Because, guess what? It’s really annoying to get emails that don’t apply to you, aren’t meant for you, or you shouldn’t waste your time reading. And if you accidentally hit Reply All, don’t send a Reply All apology; that only repeats the offense.
4. Stay Professional: Limit Emoticons, Proofread and Spell Check
Some business emails may allow the use of emoticons, but this is usually done when the people exchanging emails have already established a business relationship. Generally, you should limit or avoid the use of emoticons because they will make your email look unprofessional. Using emoticons in your cover letter as you apply for a job, for example, is unacceptable. Instead, make the next smiling face they see yours when you meet in person.
Also, proofread! Nothing says “this isn’t worth your time” to an email reader like the email sender not having taken the time to proofread the email before they sent it. So, be the gracious email writer. Before you hit the send button, read over your email one more time as if you were reading it for the first time. Make sure it sounds like you and is complete in thought. If there any lines or words you could cut and still make your point, cut them. While reading, keep an eye out for any obvious grammatical or spelling errors. If you’re in a closed office, consider reading the email aloud. Sometimes this helps you catch spelling or grammatical errors that would otherwise slip right by. And if you’re not confident in your spelling and grammar – or if you just want to play it safe – run the spelling and grammar check. That’s what it’s there for. No one will know if you used it, but everyone will notice if there are errors and you didn’t.
5. Use Time-Saving Acronyms, But Not Attachments
If the content of your email can be expressed in half a dozen words, just put it in the subject line, followed by EOM, which stands for “End of Message”. This saves the recipient having to actually open the message. Ending a note with “No need to respond” or NNTR, is likewise a wonderful act of generosity. Your recipient won’t feel guilty or rude for not writing “Thanks,” and you won’t have to waste the time opening an email that just says, “Thanks.” At thirty seconds per click-read-delete, all that politeness can really add up! And while it’s true that some acronyms confuse as much as help, these two are quickly becoming universal and worth making your readership familiar with.
Another way to save time is to not use unnecessary attachments. Graphics files used as logos, and signatures that appear as attachments, will cause the recipient to waste time trying to see if there’s something to open. It might even cause you to waste time if they write back with, “Was there supposed to be an attachment? I can’t tell.” Also, don’t include text as an attachment when it can be included in the body of the email. Put yourself in your recipient’s shoes, think about what’s the easiest way for you to take in information and save everyone a step.
Written by DSD Business Systems
