Horrifying Statistics of Email Etiquette

The number of untrained email users is staggering. Former Chief Solutions Officer of Yahoo! Tim Sanders estimates that 90% of business communication is email based and only 10% of email users receive adequate training. The statistics now get nasty.

According to market research firm Radicati Group, 89 billion business emails were sent per day in 2012. There is expected to be 3.8 billion email accounts by 2014. This means an estimated 3.42 billion email accounts will be owned by people untrained in email come 2014.

Your workplace and business likely suffers from poor email etiquette. It isn’t getting better anytime soon unless you do something about it with the rules of email etiquette in this article.

Good Netiquette

Email etiquette, broadly referred to as “netiquette”, defines the rules of email communication. Netiquette is important because an email sent cannot be retrieved. You cannot reach through the computer cables to retrieve an email to your boss in a regretful emotional out-lash where you swore to destroy his dictatorship.

Netiquette is more than writing a grammatically correct email to a friend. It builds clarity, understanding, and productivity in everyday email communication. From having the right mindset when seated to sending an email, here are the most important email etiquette rules to follow so you’re one (or many) of the 380 million email account owners in 2014 that know what to do in their inbox:

1. Control emotional emails. Do not send an email when you are angry. You could say things you later regret and the receiver of your little outburst will have a record that could be used against you. Many careers have been destroyed from angry emails. Your email may appear okay as you compose it, but let time clear your mind so you don’t regret clicking the “send” button.

I also recommend you re-read your email to check for sentences, phrases, and words that can be interpreted another way to your main intent. You may come off as rude when you try to be nice. A simple joke you think is funny may offend someone because they misinterpreted the joke. The lack of nonverbal communication in email makes it a poor medium to communicate emotion.

The lack of nonverbal communication in email makes it a poor medium to communicate emotion.

2. Provide the right amount of information. People waste too much time browsing their inbox the way it is without having to read long messages. Do humanity a favor by keeping your emails short. Cut the fat.

You still need to provide all the information upfront when possible. It is frustrating and time-consuming to ask questions for more information that could have been provided in the initial email.

3. Format it right. You don’t need to be a geek to use this rule. HyperText Markup Language (HTML) is used to make websites look pretty. Making text bold or (what you think is) pretty in email uses HTML. When you copy and paste emails from websites, you may also unknowingly copy the HTML code across.

When you format an email, the email may look different when someone receives it. Just like in face-to-face conversations, the message sent is not the message received. Some email programs are not HTML compatible so when they receive HTML emails, weird HTML code might show and other formatting issues may occur.

Simply provide a website link if you are going to copy an entire web page. If you want to copy snippets of information, not only do you risk breaking copyright laws, but at your discretion you can copy the text across to a text-file program (such as Notepad, not Microsoft Word) then copy the text from there into your email program. Copying text to a text-file program removes HTML to prevent weird formatting issues.

4. Should you reply to all?. It is frustrating to receive emails from group members who simply say “Yes, I can come” or “No” when you do not need to receive them. Stop being lazy. Take the small amount of time to address your email to the specific people your email is intended for.

5. Do not forward to all. I am a big victim of this email mistake! If you subscribe to my newsletter, you are advised to add me to your address book or whitelist to help my emails reach your inbox. With tens of thousands of subscribers, I am in many people’s address book. Subscribers often receive an email then forward it to everyone in their address book. The result for me is a daily cleanup of forwarded emails containing stories, quotes, and cute kittens.

Chain emails are so annoying! The next time you get an email with a poem, story, or series of images you love, keep them to yourself. A lovely story about patience you forward to friends may infuriate them.

6. Keep people’s email addresses hidden. It is rude to send an email to several people making their email address visible in the “To” box. Unless the recipients know each other and are comfortable sharing their email addresses, avoid this mistake. Use the Bcc (blind carbon copy) function of emails to hide recipients’ email addresses. The Bcc function ensures everyone receives the email and makes it look addressed to the specific individual.

7. Save the message thread. Not having the replied message in the sent message is the face-to-face equivalent of being bashed across the head and forgetting what was discussed in the conversation. Based on many emails I receive everyday, I estimate 30% of people do not attach their replied message. I easily forget what was sent in an email someone replied to because I frequently have discussions with multiple people at the same time.

Make it easy for people to know what you talk about by ensuring their message you reply to is attached. Google’s email service, Gmail, is great at keeping track of past messages. Be sure to change your email settings so that messages you reply to get included in your reply.

8. Be smart with your abbreviations. Friend to friend or family member to family member, the use of abbreviations is up to you. Problems arise when abbreviations in workplace emails make you appear unprofessional. If an abbreviation is used in the industry and the recipient knows what it means, use it otherwise abstain from abbreviations. Here is a useful video on email etiquette I thought you might find interesting:

A three minute Fox Providence presentation discussing email etiquette. It focuses on professionalism by avoiding abbreviations.

9. Avoid unknown abbreviations. AFAIK 404 but I’ll POAHF because I TILII. Do you know what that means? Very few people do. It means: As far as I know I have no clue, but I’ll put on a happy face because I tell it like it is.

Good email etiquette avoids unknown abbreviations. What seems apparent to you might confuse the recipient of your email. How would you like it if a friend sent you an email with ADO, YOOAD, WWMT, and other weird abbreviations? (I just made those last few ) You would feel annoyed at having to clarify something the person should realize in the first place.

10. Pick the right subject heading. If you leave the subject field empty or simply put “Re:” in the field, you avoid an important function of email communication. Your goal in personal emails is not to write the most captivating subject heading so people open your email. Write an honest and specific subject heading that reflects your email message. Instead of writing “HELP!!” to your telecommunications company, you could write “Help Needed With Phone Wires”. If I deem a subject heading is important, I can take up to 5-minutes to think of a good subject.

11. Send at a suitable time. Be weary of the time you send your email. This etiquette rule depends on a few things. Firstly, with the worldwide connectivity and never-ending discussion over the Internet, it matters little what time you send an email to someone in a different time zone. Secondly, some people do not care what time you send your email as they only care about reading what you have to say.

Be careful of the time you send emails to people such as coworkers, managers, and clients. A job candidate’s email containing a resume sent to the human resources department at 3am looks bad in the inbox. Good luck acing an interview or even getting one because of this mistake. Send an email at another time if you think the recipient will judge you poorly based on the time you send it.

Typing in capitals is the digital equivalent of yelling in someone’s face.

12. Excessive Capitalization. IT IS CONSIDERED RUDE TO TYPE IN CAPITALS. Typing in capitals is the digital equivalent of yelling in someone’s face. Hopefully, you would not yell in someone’s face so do not do it in the digital world. On the other end of the spectrum, do not type all your text in lower case. It is simple grammar.

13. Spell check. I am guilty of this a few times and have been pulled up by the grammar police for teaching communication and misspelling words. (Apparently I am not allowed to misspell words!) Spell check your formal emails. Most email providers and even web browsers provide the option to spell check. If your email service or web browser does not have a spell checker, copy your email into a word editing document to spell check it.

14. Use attachments the right way. Any email attachment over one mega byte (approximately 1000KB) is pushing email etiquette rules. Not everyone has broadband or cable, and these people do not want to spend 5 minutes downloading an unnecessary file. For large attachments, you are better off using file upload services such as Mega File Upload and 2shared. With these services, you upload a file to their website and they give you a link you can send to others where they can download the file.

Another rule for email attachments is to consider the format of your attachment. Not everyone can open a file with the .odt extension.

15. Do not request delivery and read receipts. Delivery and read receipts is an old feature in email programs. The feature lets you send an email and have the recipient confirm it was received. You are notified with an email that the person received your email if the person confirms.

The feature is an unreliable way to check if someone receives your email. It also adds more clutter to an already busy inbox. In most cases, you don’t need to know if an email was received because modern technology with email deliverability is good.

If you need to check whether your email was received, ask the person in your email to reply saying they got your message. If your message is really that important, which it rarely is over email, maybe you should phone the person. Do not blame the recipient of your email for a problem you can control.

16. Write. Send. Edit. That is obviously in the wrong order if you follow good email etiquette. By the time you click the “Submit” button, you should be confident in not having to read what you sent. Get this common email mistake in the right order: 1) Write, 2) Edit, and 3) Send. Wow! Done.

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Basic Rules to Make Someone Love You

The phone changes a few rules used in normal face-to-face communication, but not much else differs. The psychology of the two individuals at either end of the phone remain the same. Tips can be adapted to help you build your relationship.

Human psychology is about fulfilling needs and wants. You go to the grocery store to buy food to fulfill your need to eat. You buy an expensive shirt because you want to look good. You talk with others to fulfill your social and identity needs. Attraction, intimacy, and friendship work on human psychological wants and needs. Because of this, you will see how these phone skills I am about to share with you can be adapted to your everyday conversations. Learning how to make someone fall in love with you is therefore neither manipulative nor deceptive as it is a matter of you fulfilling the person’s needs and wants through communication.

The phone changes a few rules used in normal face-to-face communication, but not much else differs.

If you want others to literally fall in love with you and not just like you more, you must understand attraction. The tips shared here build likability over the phone and do not substitute for attraction. The tips when applied with techniques to build attraction in women and men makes someone fall in love with you over the phone.

Learning these phone skills is a sure-fire way to build a strong relationship fast and have your new client wanting a business relationship, a friend staying connected with you, or a cute chick liking you. A stupid word of warning: do not avoid people face-to-face once you realize the power of these phone skills!

How to Grab Attention Over the Phone

The first rule you must obey is checking the person you are talking to over the phone is receptive to you. Regardless of anything wonderful you say, nothing will matter if the person does not pay attention.

If the person has a young child howling louder than a wolf, you will be ignored. The person will hear but not listen. What you say will go no further than the phone line as they are preoccupied with distraction. When we lack the time to talk, a distraction arises, or we need to do something else, the only thoughts running through our mind are similar to: “How long will it be until this damn person shuts up? I’ve got something to do!”

The first rule of receptivity over the the phone is to make it a habit of checking if the person can talk with you. Ask upfront if the person has time to talk. After the greetings, simply say, “Do you have a couple of minutes to talk?” This makes you courteous and unobtrusive on the person’s space.

When you grab attention over the phone, you ensure the person is receptive at the start of the call. The second rule will make sure the person loves to hear you during the call.

While talking on the phone, interruptions arise. Some can be undetectable, yet others can be heard over the phone. When you hear a baby howling, a door bell ring, or a loud bang, do not ignore it! Say what sound you heard then ask if the person needs to attend it. The empathy you communicate by acknowledging potential interruptions will increase your likability and ensure the person is tuned in to what you say.

A Simple Trick to Make the Person Be Like an Old Friend

You go through a routine day while walking down the street. The world is boring, people are getting through their day, and everything appears it would be the same without you. What do you do if at the other end of the street you see a best friend you have not met for five years?

You see your best friend and your energy amplifies a gazillion times! Memories and feelings gush to you in an intense emotional rush. You run up to the person. “It’s you! I can’t believe it!” You are ecstatic to stumble upon your friend!

The lesson you can learn from this is what I call the “It’s You!” technique. When you call a person or answer the phone, say your normal greeting in an average mood. Once the person introduces himself, you become surprised, or rather energized, to talk with the person. Wait for the person’s introduction then amp up your energy as if you were talking to that old friend you saw on the street. This makes the person pleasantly thrilled to talk to you.

If you always talk energetically over the phone, your energy with the “It’s You!” technique will not have the sincerity and pleasant thrill. The high energy is normal for you. Only when you authentically convey happiness to be talking to the person more than you would with normal people does this technique work. The feelings of importance the person receives makes it a great technique to help them fall in love with you over the phone.

(In an article on how to be interesting without saying a word, I applied this escalating technique on smiling by gradually increasing your smile when you meet someone; instead of walking around smiling or instantly giving off a big smile. These two “escalation techniques” bring sincerity and warmth to your personality.)

An Age-Old Technique to Be Liked More

The fourth tip I recommend you whack into your new bag of tricks over the phone is mentioning the person’s name more often. As Dale Carnegie in How to Win Friends and Influence People writes, “Remember that a person’s name is to that person the sweetest and most important sound in any language.” Our names are a sweet tune of music to our ears. It is a fast way to build any relationship.

You need to know one warning about this technique. If you mention someone’s name too often, you come off as a try hard, needy, and desperate person – much like a poor salesman.

If you are like most people, you can comfortably increase the frequency you say the person’s name. You can get away with mentioning their name more often than in a face-to-face conversation because the phone is a different medium. The phone inhibits intimacy.

If the person begins to mentally drift away from you, hearing their name will reinvigorate their interest. The person can subliminally fall in love with you.

How to Make Up for No Body Language With Your Voice

Another difference you can take advantage of over the phone to enhance your relationships and make the person fall in love with you is countering the inability to communicate with body language. Our nonverbal communication is a large tower from where we broadcast strong signals. A simple message like “you’re funny” can be strengthened many times through body language. Some attraction experts even claim body language alone is enough to make someone fall in love with you.

Your voice is the only form of nonverbal communication over the phone making it a booster or destroyer to friendship.

Your nonverbal communication helps others understand you. Without the visual option to see one another over the phone, yours and their inability to read body language can hurt understanding, connection, likability, and attraction. Your voice is the only form of nonverbal communication over the phone making it a booster or destroyer to friendship.

Improve your phone skills despite the lack of connection built through body language by communicating extra energy with your voice. I estimate varying your vocal tonality and energy an extra 30%. If you are happy the person did something well, put an extra 30% of energy in your voice when saying, “That is awesome! Congratulations!” If you are sad, lose 30% of energy in your voice by saying, “I’m… I’m sorry to hear that…” The change of energy communicated through your voice establishes empathy to build a connection with your partner and enhance your relationship fast. The person will have a feeling of being next to you.

The Only Way to Build Rapport Over the Phone

Rapport is being in sync with the person. It is the hidden key to make people feel connected to you. Establishing rapport ties in with mentioning the person’s name more often and compensating for a lack of body language via your voice because the two techniques build a connection that help the two of you get in sync.

Learning to build rapport over the phone is necessary if you want to build a strong relationship fast. Unfortunately, a complete guide to building rapport is far too complex to discuss in this article, yet the premise of it involves being like the person in as many ways as possible.

One particular characteristic of the person I highly advise you to match is their mood. Mood-matching helps you rapidly build a strong relationship and make someone fall in love with you.

To understand mood-matching, think back to a time you were feeling unhappy and someone bounding with joy tried to cheer you up with their happiness. How did you feel afterward? Most likely more annoyed! Their happiness did not relate to you because the two of you were at polarized emotional levels. The person was happy and you were sad.

You can better relate to people and build this “connection” when you communicate a mood similar to the person. If someone greets you with an energetic “Hi Josh!” meet them at their energy level or higher, “Hi Sue!” If the person tells you a funny story, let them hear your mood, “That’s crazy!” then laugh.

Compensate for the lack of body language over the phone with a 30% extra variance of energy in your voice. Mood is one of many communication factors you can match when talking to someone over the phone to build rapport.

When you combine all these tips to build a strong relationship over the phone with the ways to build attraction, you have the phone skills to make someone fall in love with you! Even better, these phone techniques are not limited to love. Apply these skills to potential clients, family members, and those annoying customers. The phone breaks geographic boundaries, but now you can break emotional boundaries.