Effective Email

Writing
Nor Lailatul Azilah bt
Hamdzah
1

Layout
What is E-mail ?
How to Make an Effective E-Mail.
Few common e-mail habits that cause
Problems.
Structure of E-Mail..
I.

II.
III.
IV.
V.

Addressing.
Subjects.
Message Text.
Attachments.
Signature.
2

What is E-Mail ?
Text-based mail sent via the computer from
one person to another

A Push Technology
It is One-to-Many and almost Free

How to Make an Effective

E-mail
Selecting Your Audience Correctly
Using Distribution Lists
Composing Your Messages
Make the heading meaningful
Keep each message short and clear.
Start each message by stating its purpose/context

Few common e-mail habits

that cause Problems
Changing the topic without changing the

subject.
Including multiple subjects
Misaddressed recipients
Displaying addresses of recipients who are
strangers to each other
Replying vs. forwarding
5

Before you compose

The first step in writing e-mail message is to
identify the purpose of the message and
determining what the recipient reading the
message has to do.

Focus your objective. Achieve the five I's:

inform, inquire, influence, instruct and incite.

Focus your content. Don't let unnecessary ideas

intrude on your principal message.

Structure of E-Mail

Addressing
Subject
Message Text
Attachments
Signature
7

1. Addressing
Its the address of the recipient.
Use BCC to protect Email addresses unless everyone
knows each other.
Maintain address book.

Salutations

Do not use "Sir" or "Mr." unless absolutely certain that

your correspondent is male.

It is safer to use "Ms." instead of "Miss" or "Mrs."

Beware of using a diminutive ( Chris, or Bob) if you aren't
certain your correspondent uses it. It might rankle Judith
to be called Judy; Robert might hate being called Bob.

If you are addressing a group of people, you can say

"Dear" plus the unifying attribute. For example:
Dear Project Managers: Or:
Dear Team Members:

Salutations
Be careful about cultural differences. In United
States, you can usually get away with a first name,
but Germans are quite formal; they can work sideby-side for years and never get around to a firstname basis. Starting a message to Germany with
Dear Hans might be a bad idea.

"Good Morning" and "Good Afternoon" don't make

sense with email, as the sun may have moved
significantly by the time your correspondent gets
around to it.

 The To: line

The To line and the Subject line are integrated.
Each individual on the To line is responsible for
taking the action (or part of an action) outlined
on the Subject line and the message relates
directly to them.

 The Cc: line

No action or response is expected of individuals
on the Cc line. The recipient needs only to read
or file the message.

The individuals whose work is indirectly

affected by the communication should be
included on the Cc line.

 Bcc: line
Use Bcc field sparingly.
In general, it's best not to use the Bcc line to slyly
escalate matters. There is always a chance that
the individual on the Bcc line could hit "Reply
All" and unintentionally reveal that the matter
was escalated.

2. Subject
Precise headline for the message
Makes easier to handle of e-MAIL
Avoid sending e-mail with No subject

14

Q. Why is the subject line so

important?
Good subjects line helps reader answer these
questions:

1.When should I read this e-mail?

2.What is this e-mail about?
3.Will I need to do anything?
4.Can I delete this e-mail without reading it?

Ineffective subject lines

Subject

Date&Time

Hi

9:17 am

questions

10:11 am

Meeting

12:44 pm

One more thing...........

3:02 pm

Some thoughts

4:21pm

Effective subject lines

Subject

Date&Time

Party planning meeting rescheduled for 3pm

9:17 am

Help: I cant find the draft for the Smith Paper 10:11 am
Reminder: peer-review articles due tomorrow
(3/30)

12:44 pm

Questions about Sociology 210 project

3:02 pm

Congratulations to Jennifer for winning Nobel

Prize

4:21pm

Subject

Date

Re: Question about Smith paper (was: please

help with this!)

10:11
am

Change subject lines when

necessary

Subject

Date

Re: Re: Re: [Fwd: [Fwd: Reminder: Deadline

for Spring Semester Is Jan. 15]]

9:17
am

Remove extra email prefixes

Which of these subject lines helps readers

answer the 4 questions?

1. Last Day to Order Computer at Discount June 6, 2013

2. Silver Seal Sample Bottles
3. Re: CHANT meeting
4. Payment for Eddy Breeze
5. Join me in the Director's Box this Sunday, June 22?
6. Potential Commuting Problems Tomorrow Friday, April 16
7. Re: Arts Academy
8. Sales Plan - Feedback
9. Vacation Leave
10. New York Music Ensemble - This Sunday!
11. RE: Project update
12. Listing of 2011 materials/handouts Please review and respond
by January 23.

1. Last Day to Order Computer at Discount June 6, 2013

2. Silver Seal Sample Bottles
3. Re: CHANT meeting
4. Payment for Eddy Breeze
5. Join me in the Director's Box this Sunday, June 22?
6. Potential Commuting Problems Tomorrow Friday, April 16
7. Re: Arts Academy
8. Sales Plan - Feedback
9. Vacation Leave
10. New York Music Ensemble - This Sunday!
11. RE: Project update
12. Listing of 2011 materials/handouts Please review and respond
by January 23.

How to write a useful subject line

Begin with a noun that identifies the type of message youre
writing

Question
Inquiry
Request
Recommendation
Suggestion
Proposal
Instructions
Procedure

Policy
Schedule
Invitation
Announcement
Follow-up
Update
Alert
Agenda

3. Message Text

Keep the message focused and readable

Keep it short
Brevity and clarity
Use paragraphs
Break into paragraphs; skip lines between
Avoid fancy typefaces
22

Message Text ( cont. )

Use * * to highlight text if you must
Write in standard professional English with
Capitalization and correct spelling

Quote back using contexts

Identify yourself clearly to cold contacts.
Hello, I amThe reason I am writing
Hello, so-in-so suggested I contact you
23

Composing the content

Remove Pronouns: Imagine getting a
response on Monday to some email that you
can't quite remember sending on Friday.
I talked to them about it the other day, and
they want to see the other one before they
make up their minds.

Your response would probably be the highly

articulate, "Huh???"

Composing the Content

The most important step in e-mail message is

to identify the type of action that the recipient

has to take after reading your message.

If multiple individuals are responsible for

different actions, clearly indicate who is
responsible for what.

Always include due dates for each action.

Composing the Content

The four most common types of actions are:
Actionrecipient has to perform a physical action. Ex: "Provide
a proposal for a 5% reduction in Travel & Entertainment."

Respondrecipient needs only to respond to your message. Ex:

Can you attend the staff meeting on Friday?"

Read Onlyrecipient needs only to read your message. Ex:

Please read the attached sales plan before next staff meeting on
Dec 12th."

FYI Onlyrecipient needs only to file your message for future

reference. Even reading the message is optional. Ex: "Enclosed

for your records are your completed.

Poor Email Content

Jon,
Hey, I was just thinking about the meeting we had about the new
workshop you were planning for next week about resume-writing. I think
that we may have forgotten to include all of the students who might benefit
from this workshop. There are several groups of students at the School of
Public Health that were not on your list. Of course you may have added
them to you list since our last meeting. Sara from the School of Public
Health contacted me to ask if the students from the Epidemiology program
were on our list of included students. She also wanted a list of all of the
included departments from the School of Public Health. Can you send me
a list of all of the included student groups? I can then send the relevant
information on to Sara because she needs this information by tomorrow.
Thanks,
Rachell

Better Email Content

Jon,
Can you send me a list of the students included in the resumewriting workshop by tomorrow?
We may have forgotten to include all of the students who
might benefit from this workshop. There are several groups of
students at the School of Public Health that were not on your
list. Sara from the School of Public Health contacted me to ask
if the students from the Epidemiology program were on our
list. I will send her that information tomorrow after I get the
list from you.
Thanks,
Rachell

4. Attachments
Cut and paste relevant parts of attachment into text of
Email.

Use URL links instead.

Upload attachments to website and cite URL.
Compress large attachments and send attachments only
when they are absolutely necessary.

Have a good virus scanner in place. People will not be

very happy with mails full of viruses.

29

5. E-mail Signature

Use an appropriate signature

Brief (4-5 lines)
Informative
I. provide all contact information
Professional
I. do not include pictures, quotes,
animations.

II. Whenever a piece of contact

information changes, make sure your
signature updated accordingly.

Identification
When you send email to someone who doesn't know
you, immediately answer these questions:

Who are you?

How did you learn of your correspondent?
What do you want from your correspondent?
Why should your correspondent pay attention to you?
If you can't answer the last question, consider
whether you should even send the email.

Identification
Here is a ideal message which answers all the
questions mentioned earlier:
Dear Ms. Kulkarni:
I am an editor at Penguin Publishing Company, Inc.
I sat next to your brother at Inox last week, and he
mentioned that you are interested in publishing a
book based Indian recipes. I would be very
interested in receiving a proposal from you.

Before Sending
Improper spelling, grammar and punctuation
give a bad impression, and can sometimes
even change the meaning of the text.

Read the email through the eyes of the

recipient before you send it.

Replies
Answer swiftly.
Each e-mail should be replied to within at least

24 hours, and preferably within the same working

day.

If the email is complicated, send an email

saying that you have received it and that you

will get back to them. This will put the
peoples mind at rest and usually they will
then be very patient!

Replies
Respond only to messages that require one. When
replying make sure that you are adding value to the
conversation, truly moving it forward.

While replying to an e-mail message with an

attachment, which is to accompany your reply, you

must forward the message instead of using the "Reply"
or "Reply All" button. Otherwise, the attachment is not
included with the message.

Acronymns

ASAP: as soon as possible

BTW: By the way
CU: See you (good-bye)
FAQs: Frequently Asked Questions
HTH: Hope this helps
TIA: Thanks in Advance

Netiquett
e:
The Rules to
Email and
Communicatin
g Online

What is Netiquette?

Netiquette is the code of the

internet because the internet
is a network and etiquette is a
code.

It comes from network and

etiquette.

The Basic Rule

The basic rule of
netiquette is to use
good manners.

Core Netiquette Rules

Always spell check & proof read
before sending or posting. Also, if
you are emailing an employer or
possible employer, you should avoid
slang.

Core Netiquette Rules

Do not use ALL CAPS, because online
it looks like you are shouting.

Dont send too much email (the

more you send the greater
chance you have of sending a
bad message.) Be open-minded
in what you receive (the more
you receive the better informed
you are because you are
receiving more information.)

Do not send e-mail late at

night because it may call your
lifestyle into question.

Think about it: What

would it say to me as your

teacher if you emailed me
a question about your
homework at 2 a.m.?

Any Question?