Ten Cardinal Rules of E-mail Manners
- Respond to your emails promptly
Always try to reply to your emails promptly. This way the sender will not be kept in a suspense waiting for your reply. If you need time to complete a task or check on some information before replying, at least drop a short note to inform the sender that you will be getting back to him/her as soon as you can.
- Target your emails specifically
Don't fall into the Cc trap. You should select your recipients carefully and not place every Tom, Dick and Harry in your To or Cc list. This will flood their mailboxes unnecessarily. Send your message only to the people who genuinely need to know about the content of your mail. If you need to send an email broadcast, use the Bcc field instead of the To or Cc field. This way, when a recipient "Reply All' to the mail, everyone else will not be unnecessarily hit by the mail storm.
- Use clear and concise language
In this modern age everyone is too busy to go through flowery language in mails. Get to the point and set your objectives clearly. Besides, everyone has tons of other mails to go through. Your recipients will appreciate it.
- Format your messages appropriately
Most email clients now support HTML mail format and have many formatting tools for your use. Do make use of different colours, bullet points or indentation to make your mail look clearer and well formatted. This will make it easier on the eyes of the recipient and focus on your points.
- Watch those attachments
Some attachments can be very large and will choke up the recipient's finite mailbox size. Always compress them before attaching large attachments. This will also speed up the download time for the recipient, especially if s/he is using a slow dial-up link.
- Put a short and meaningful subject heading
The subject heading of your mail will help the recipient understand the content of your mail before s/he opens it. In future, a good heading will also make it easier for the recipient and yourself in finding that old mail among your hundred other mails.
- Spring clean your mailbox regularly
Don't wait until spring before you clean up your mailbox. Sorting and filing mails into subfolders will make it easier for you to search for them in the future. Regularly archiving of old mail items into a Personal Folder will prevent your mailbox from getting full. A full mailbox will not be able to receive mails and this can be frustrating to senders. (Mailbox size is a finite resource, you can't keep asking for more space all the time!)
- Be cool!
Watch that temper before you fire out a mail which may be offensive to the recipient. Cool down before you reply to a mail which have irritated you.
- Never send chain mail or SPAM
Mass mails are a total waste of time and resources. Spamming is the practice of sending large quantities of mails to people who did not request it, do not want it, and are not interested in it. Don't do it!
- Be nice to IT support staff
Last but not least, always be nice to the IT support staff. They are always willing to assist you in your enquires.