Living, Breathing Languages: Basics of Email Etiquette

Emails, along with texting, IMing and face-timing, have slowly but progressively been anchoring themselves as the standard way for communications for our current and future generations. But just because these forms of communicating can be so informal and open to a “whatever goes” policy doesn’t mean that all situations merit this informal stance. As such, it is always important for every individual to know the basics of how to politely or professionally write or answer an email as not to unwillingly antagonize the recipient.

If you have been dealing with emails for a while, chances are you already know this information, either because you’ve research it or because you’ve been the recipient of bad email etiquette. This simple tutorial is aimed to people that have had limited use of email and want to know the basic concepts.

Email Providers:

There are tons of email providers on the Internet, some of the major companies that offer a free service are Gmail, Yahoo!, Hotmail, and AOL. To use a service from either company you must sign up and create a free account which in turn grants you the email privileges as well as other functionalities. Many sites and organizations also provide their clients or employees with access to a “personal” email accounts. Usually designated for uses related to the company or organizations, they tend to be more limited that their free counterparts. Some of these places include Universities, different types of Work Places and Institutions.

Information Manager Applications:

Two of the most known information manager platforms are Microsoft Outlook and Mozilla Thunderbird. Both can be “match” to your personal email accounts and directly manage the email flow from one convenient place without the need to individually enter each website for those who have more than one email account. Outlook comes as part of the Microsoft Office Suite and aside from managing emails, it can also manage multiple calendars, contacts and tasks. Thunderbird can be downloaded for free from the Mozilla web page and considered as a cross-platform email and news client. Thunderbird can be personalized through add-ons and theme selection.

Parts of the Email:

Click the image to enlarge it.

To – here goes the email address of the recipient.
Cc – "carbon copy", secondary recipient of the email, visible to every recipient of the email.
Bcc – "blank carbon copy"; for hidden recipients, email addresses added in this field will not be seen by the other recipients.
Subject – here goes the title of your email
Content Space – is where you write your email.
Attach a file – any document, picture, or type of file can be uploaded as long as it weight less than the limit amount established by your email provider.
Formatting Tool Bar – where you tweak and fix your content. Keys included are (from left to right):

Bold – bolden the selected text.
Italics – italicizes the selected text.
Underline – underlines the selected text.
Font – font style.
Size – text size.
Text Color – choose a color for the text.
Highlight Color – highlights the selected text.
Emoticon insertion – inserts an emoticon or smiley face.
Link creation – creates a hyperlink to a desired destination online.
Numbered List – creates a numbered item’s list
Bulleted List – creates a bulleted item’s list.
Indent Less – indents the selected text less.
Indent More – indents the selected text more.
Quote ("") – marks the selected text or soon to be added text as a quote.
Align Left – aligns the text to the left margin.
Align Center – aligns the text to the center of the content space.
Align Right – aligns the text to the right margin.
Remove Formatting – eliminates all formatting changes from the content of the email or a selected section of text.
Plain Text – allows the email to be written without any formatting.

Check spelling – a correction tool for individual word spelling.
Send – send the email to its recipient(s).
Save Now – saves the email for future reviewing; does not send the email.
Discard – eliminates the email without saving or sending it.

Basic Etiquette:

Use the subject to express in a single sentence a clear idea of what the email is about.
If sending a private email to a dear one while that person is at work use the subject to state that the email should be open while alone.
Balance the content. Give enough information as part of the content that the recipient can identify your ideas without cluttering the email with unnecessary information.
Do not use terms like URGENT or IMPORTANT or constantly tick the “high priority” checkbox unless absolutely necessary.
Be concise and to the point.
Reply an email as fast as possible; the longer you leave the bigger the chances that you’ll forget about it.
However, before you reply an email (especially one that enraged you), give yourself a bit of time to cool off and have a clearer mind when writing your response; this could avoid potential regretful moments.
Check your spelling and grammar before sending the email. When in doubt, write the email in a word processor program to verify; then simply copy/paste the content into the email and style as necessary.
Adding spaces in between paragraphs makes the email easier to read.
Unless you are writing a personal email or the recipient is familiar enough and understands acronyms, do not use them; especially for professional or academic emails. Leave LOL, BRB and others of the sort for more personal matters.
Read the email throughout before hitting send.
Do not use capital letters or uppercase, in the internet world this is the equivalent as shouting.
Replying to the same message creates a thread, do this to keep the conversation contained to one single email.
Clean up the thread before sending it forward. When an email has been send back and forth a few times the previous statements tend to clutter the thread; by erasing the unnecessary text you have a cleaner, shorter email.
Be wary of the ‘reply all’ button. Unless is necessary to truly reply to all the senders don’t do it. Is better if you just select the ones that you need to reply to.
Avoid chain letters, very few people welcome these; the vast majority of people just finds them annoying.
File Attachment – Sometimes attachments can be forgotten and we end up sending an ‘empty email’; to avoid this attach the documents before writing the email.
File Attachment – Do not attach unnecessary files to the email and try to keep them as small (size wise) as possible. All email providers have a limit to how ‘heavy’ a file can be so that it can be sent through; combining several files increases your email size. Size limit varies from provider to provider; best to check the email capabilities before trying to send a big email and find yourself unable to do so.
Remember, emails are easy to hack and the information made public. Choose your words carefully.