Politeness-
Begin all your emails with a greeting. Make sure to use appropriate salutations as follows-
- If you don’t know a person’s gender, use the words Dear Abc Smith i.e. use their full name.
- Don’t forget to use the person’s honorable title word i.e. Dr. or Professor, etc.
- If writing to a friend or a colleague, start with Hello followed by their first name.
- For a more formal touch, you can begin your email with “Good morning” or similar greeting
- Complete And Correct Information
Always make sure to include all the relevant details about the subject your writing. Remember to include the details about what, when, why, how, where. All the necessary information which your recipient might require must be present in your email.
- From, To, Cc, Bcc
While writing an email, strive to use the address columns carefully-
- FROM- When the recipient receives your email, this column will contain your email ID which will be visible to him/her and would allow them to know that this email came from you.
- TO- Enter the email addresses of your primary recipients here.
- CC- CC stands for Carbon Copy. Enter the email id the person(s) you want to inform of the message.
- BCC- BCC stands for blind carbon copy. The recipients in this field will not be visible to other recipients.
- Attachments
When sending large files via email, always zip/compress the files before you send them, so that the recipient can easily download and view the files. Compressing temporarily reduces the file size. Also, if possible, resize the images and other graphics to around 600-700 pixels in width for easy sharing.
- Chain Messages
Never forward the chain messages or advertisements you receive to other users unless you know it will be okay for them to receive such emails from you. Generally, It is considered bad etiquette to forward such messages as they might be useless and uncalled for.
- General Behavior-
Never communicate through mails when you are feeling emotional or cranky. Allow yourself to settle down, make sense of the situation, think of the appropriate response and draft the email in a polite and subtle manner to get your point across to the receiver clearly and humbly.
- Replies
After you have sent your message to the recipient, allow him/her sufficient time to revert to you. Never bombard a person with repeated emails, nudging them to respond to you- it will only make them irritated.
Also, sometimes people are too busy to read their emails right away. The usual time required by them to reply can range from 1 hour to 48 hours. Be patient.
- Emoji
Emojis are great when you are texting via IM or Whatsapp, but emails are a formal medium of communication. While there is no harm in using an emoji where it’s needed; do not overuse an emoji. One emoji (If needed) per email should suffice!
- File Formats
Always use appropriate formats for your data while sharing it via email. For example, if you want to share a picture, most commonly used formats are .jpg and .png.
Also, make sure the file extension is typed correctly or else your recipient might not be able to view the files.
