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5 tips to writing emails that will always get you a reply

5 tips to writing emails that will always get you a reply

Curated from: ideas.ted.com

Ideas, facts & insights covering these topics:

6 ideas  ·  4.5K reads

Emails are fundamental to our daily communications

About 300 billion emails are sent around the globe every day. On average, people working in an office get 121 emails per working day. We often send and read them without thinking about them for a second.

But emails are vital. We send them because of traceability or a time difference, or we need many people reading the same thing.

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Make an excellent first impression: the subject line

An effective subject line consists of three things:

  • It is short
  • It calls for action
  • It indicates familiarity with the recipient

For example, Meeting tomorrow, please respond!

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Add colour and feeling to your email

Sending an email written in black and white is like speaking in a monotone voice, without using your body or face.

We can add feeling by using different kinds of punctuation and emojis - the digital body language. Think of digital body language as the spices and seasoning - depending on the culture, environment and background, you may use more or less, or none at all.

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Keep an email as short as a tweet

Research shows that many emails aren't read but just skimmed or deleted. Every word you write past your first 40, you directly reduce the chances of getting an answer.

  • Be very brief, around 280 characters. But that may be impossible.
  • Otherwise, the part where you ask for something can be kept to the length of a tweet.
  • Meeting notes can be included as an attachment.
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Use names at critical moments

Dale Cargenie stated that "A person's name is to him or her the sweetest and most important sound in any language."

If you use a person's name at critical moments and in proportion, you will increase the likelihood of getting an answer. But, if you misspell the person's name, you can completely ruin your email.

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The power of "one last thing"

The last impression can be just as powerful as the first impression. It's the one thing that sticks with your reader.

If there is one important thing to say or one vital thing you need from your recipient, try to wait until the end and put it in the P.S. line.

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