Writing Emails
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Writing Emails provides guidelines for effectively writing emails. Key points include: - Give emails a clear, specific subject to avoid being mistaken for spam. - Keep greetings and endings polite and professional, using titles and surnames with those of higher status and first names with peers. - Clearly state the purpose and any required actions in the first and last paragraphs. - Refer to and properly name any attachments included. - Sign off with your full name to identify the sender clearly.
Writing Emails
- 1. Writing Emails by Piet van der Laan
- 2. Subjects Give the message a subject/title. E-mail messages without a subject may not be opened because of a fear of viruses and especially note that it is very easy to forget to type this important information.
- 3. Subject Contents Keep the subject short and clear but avoid such headings as: ‘Hello’, ‘Good news’, ‘Message from Pete’. These are headings common in messages containing viruses. Write short and specific headings such as: Order No. 45464XJ, Delayed Shipment, Laboratory Equipment Order
- 4. Greetings Start the message with a greeting so as to help create a friendly but business-like tone. If you have communicated with the receiver previously and he/she is at a similar level to you, then the use of the first name would be appropriate. If the receiver is more senior to you, or if you are in doubt, it would be safer to use the person’s surname name together with a title, e.g. Dear Mr Smithson, Dear Ms Stringer.
- 5. Greetings (2) It is also becoming quite common to write the greeting without a comma. Dear Miss Lawson Dear Pete
- 6. Purpose Start with a clear indication of what the message is about in the first paragraph. Give full details in the following paragraph(s). Make sure that the final paragraph indicates what should happen next. For example: I will send a messenger to your office on Tuesday morning to collect the faulty goods.
- 7. Action Any action that you want the reader to do should be clearly described, using politeness phrases. Subordinates should use expressions such as: 'Could you...’ ‘I would be grateful if...’ Superior staff should also use polite phrases, for example: 'Please...'.
- 8. Attachments Make sure you refer, in the main message, to any attachments you are adding and of course make extra sure that you remember to include the attachment(s). Copy-and-paste text-only contents into the body of the e-mail. If you use an attachment, make sure the file name describes the content, and is not too general; e.g. 'message.doc' is bad, but 'QA Report 2009.doc' is good
- 9. Endings End the message in a polite way. Common endings are: Yours sincerely, Best regards, Best wishes, Regards If you did not put a comma after the greeting at the beginning of the message, then do not put a comma after the ending either.
- 10. Names Include your name at the end of the message. The problem is that often the email address of the sender does not indicate exactly who it is from, e.g. 0385915d@polyu.edu.hk. Please follow these guidelines with all e-mail messages that you send. Kind regards, Pete Miller Resource manager
- 11. Questions?