Seven Tips For Sending Effective Emails

It shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone that we get a lot of emails here at Worldstart. Most of the time, the emails are appropriately addressed and formatted, but every once in awhile we get some that make us wonder. So I decided I’d put together a tip with some tips on using email.

1. Email addresses are not case sensitive. This comes more from people calling in than actual emails.  The email address Audra@worldstart.com is the same as audra@worldstart.com. Whether you set up the email with a capital letter or not, the email will still get to you if someone chooses not to use a capital letter.

2. Avoid typing in all capital letters. This is, in essence, yelling at anyone who reads the email. I know it may be easier to see, but it’s generally considered rude to type in all caps.

3. Don’t put the whole email in the subject line. I’ve seen this more than I’d like to say. Here’s an example that I made up from my own email, but I’ve seen similar:

A subject line is designed to tell what the email is about so the person receiving it can look quickly and have some idea what the email is referencing. It’s like the title of a book. Keep it short and sweet.

4. Check how your name appears in the From line. Make sure you check how your name appears when you send the email. This is the name that shows up on the receivers inbox and what shows up when they are replying. I have responded by using the wrong name based on the From area of an email more times than I’d like to admit. You can usually check this by going into your email settings. I’ve included an example of what you would look for on Gmail, Outlook.com, and Yahoo. If you need to change it, simply hit Edit in the options. Here’s some step by step instructions to do it in Gmail.

5. Avoid using the Reply All button. This is especially important in a business setting, because many people don’t need a bunch of responses filling up their inbox when they already get 50 emails or more a day. Unless there is a valid reason everyone who was sent the email needs to read the reply, simply hit Reply rather than Reply All. We’ve been included on some family discussion emails here at Worldstart because we got accidentally added to an email, and then everyone chose to use Reply All.

6. Don’t include confidential information. This includes information that you would not want shared or passed on. Who is stopping the email recipient from forwarding a juicy gossip email to all their friends? This also includes information like a credit card number or account number. Email is NOT a secure form of communication in general. It could easily be intercepted or hacked into.

7. Spell check! This will make your emails seem more professional. Also avoid using “text language” like “How r u” in an email. In addition, check your punctuation use. If you use an exclamation point a lot or if you ignore punctuation all together, it can make the emails hard to read. If you are filling out a form on a website and expect a reply, it’s very important to check what you have entered. I’ve had many times where I’ve answered a support request and gotten a notice that the email address is not correct, simply because it was entered incorrectly on the request form.

 ~ Audra