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Do you tend to ramble on when writing an e-mail; never
quite making your point? Some people write e-mails like they are warming
up a cold car: they just keep writing until it feels like they are done.
Eventually they may get to their point or they may not.
As the receiver of this type of a message, you have to
wade through sentence after sentence hoping to find meaning in this
disorganized chaos.
Organize Your Thoughts
Before you begin an e-mail, take some time to organize
your thoughts on a piece of paper. Jot down some ideas you want to cover
in your message. Put your ideas down in any order they come to you. Keep
writing until you run out of ideas.
Now pretend you are the reader of this message and ask
yourself what you would want to know. Jot down some more ideas from the
reader’s viewpoint.
For example, if I was going to write an e-mail to
schedule a meeting, I would consider not only what I wanted to tell my
employees, but what they needed to know to respond to my e-mail.
Decide on Your Main Points
Once you have all your ideas on paper, take a look
through them and decide what the main points are that you want to cover.
Organize the points into a logical order. Then decide what information
you need to support those main points.
In my e-mail to schedule a meeting I would include the
reason for the meeting, date, time, location and agenda. If I expected
the employees to give project updates at the meeting, I might include a
form for them to use in supplying the information.
Introductory Paragraph
An e-mail can be as simple as one paragraph, but the
whole message should not be more than one computer screen. What you want
to do is get to your main point as soon as possible. Quite often, the
first sentence in an e-mail is your main point and the remainder of the
paragraph is supporting information.
What you don’t want to do is put in useless words as an
introduction to your main idea. For instance, don’t write statements
such as, “The purpose of this e-mail is to” or “The reason I am writing
this e-mail is to.” Both those statements are unnecessary. Simply start
with you main point: The quarterly sales meeting will be on September
23.
Review and Edit Your Writing
After you’ve organized your main points and written the
e-mail, it’s time to reread what you’ve written. Does it make sense? Are
the points clear? What other information needs to be included? Did you
make it easy for the reader to respond? Did you include relevant
background information?
Subject Line
Does your subject line introduce your e-mail or is it
the message? The subject line should not be the message. A subject line
should be six words or less and specific to the e-mail. It is a phrase,
not a complete sentence with punctuation.
Really think about what you want to put in as the
subject line. It should entice the reader to open the e-mail and be
descriptive of the e-mail. Try not to use weak subject lines.
For instance, “Quarterly Sales Meeting” is descriptive,
but not specific. A better choice would be “Winter 2005 Quarterly Sales
Meeting.”
Proof Before Sending
After you are satisfied with your message and subject
line, be sure to reread everything for grammatical and spelling errors.
Run a spell-check and continue looking for spelling errors or punctuation
errors.
Although this technique may take a little more time, it
is well worth the effort. A well written e-mail positively reflects upon
you and your business.
© 2005 Michelle Howe
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