9 Common Mistakes to Avoid in Your E-mails
E-mail is a means of communication used by everyone. At work, at home, by professionals, brands, family, friends, a French Internet user receives about 40 e-mails per day! 40 opportunities to make small mistakes, yet easy to avoid.
Good to know: by organizing your mailbox well, you can already simplify your life. Use filters so that messages arrive directly in well-ordered folders. This will help you sort through them in the blink of an eye!
Abusing the reply to all
If you are the recipient of a group message and everyone uses the “reply to all” function, you are in the middle of a chat!
Indeed, if one person starts to “reply to all” to ask for information or to continue the discussion, the whole chain is flooded with messages that sometimes concern only a handful of people.
To avoid abuse:
– Hide the recipients in “CCI”.
– Ask recipients to reply in the form of a “Private Message”.
For the record: in 2012, a simple administrative message sent by an American university to all of its 40,000 students caused an endless chain of emails that could have been avoided by not making the list of recipients public.
Replying like a text message
If you grew up at the birth of SMS, you might have mastered the art of associated language where all words are reduced to their phonetics to save time and money. Only this language intended for the cell phone must remain on a cell phone! Similarly, avoid:
– Tick-tock answers without taking the time to proofread. This will inevitably play tricks on you!
– Simple “OK”, “I don’t agree” and other “Yes”, “No”, “Maybe”. If the message is short, call or get up and talk to your colleague! If not, argue and explain what it means.
Good to know: SMS language was born out of a desire to save money. Indeed, in the ’90s and early 2000s, SMS was charged per 160 characters. It was, therefore, necessary to find a way to communicate while taking up as little space as possible.
Expecting an immediate response
Get used to it. Not everyone is addicted to new technologies like you!
It’s not because your recipient can answer you that he will necessarily do so: that’s the advantage of email and SMS. If you want an immediate response, talk to the person directly or call them!
Sending professional emails on weekends
The rule of professional kindness imposes not to send emails on weekends:
To avoid looking like a superior who abuses his subordinates.
To avoid the risk of becoming a “workaholic”.
Because in case of an emergency, the telephone is still the only way to go.
Forgetting the attachment
Whether it’s haste or a simple lack of imagination, the “subject” field deserves your full attention, whether it’s for a business or personal message. Indeed, it allows:
– to be taken seriously by your interlocutor;
– the receiver to process the information more efficiently (urgent – important);
– everyone to easily find the discussion.
Good to know: when sending an application, never forget to add a subject to your e-mail. Indeed, the recruiter sorts his candidates according to the subject before opening the message.
Abusing gifs
Animated gifs can be smileys made available to you in an e-mail administrator or short extracts from films or series found on the Internet.
Often, by using common references, e-mail chains use and abuse these little playful extras. But be careful!
– Gifs are to be avoided in professional messages.
– If you use them sparingly, it’s funny; if you use them systematically, it’s not so funny.
Abusing capital letters
In Internet language, the use of capital letters symbolizes shouting.
Imagine for a moment leading a discussion that is essentially made up of shouting, and you will understand why capital letters are incompatible with healthy digital communication!
Never reading your emails
It’s tempting when you know that over half of the emails you receive every day are spam… However, since email is a widespread means of communication and used by administrations, not opening your emails can make you miss important information.
Misspelling proper names
Before writing to someone, make sure you spell their name correctly by checking your documents or with a few clicks on the Internet.
Poor spelling:
– Vexes even unsuspecting people.
– Makes you look like a sloppy person.
– Disqualifies you for an appointment or any request mentioned in your message.
Good to know: systematically check the spelling of your emails, especially the subject line. If you make a mistake, it may be impossible to find it!
