15 Tips for Business Email Etiquette

I work in an office as many of you do. I get 100s of emails a day. Too many times Ive received
emails that left me thinking, Does this person have any sense of professionalism; why am I
doing business with them?
Here are some tips on business email etiquette that Ive picked up over the years:
1. Use your business email; not Gmail, Yahoo, Hotmail (or the dinosaurs that still use AOL);
especially dont use emails like fratboypartier@gmail.com; either give up the college emails or
only use business emails





2. If there a lot of people on an email, dont automatically replay to all; only reply to the
necessary people; this is especially true when replying congrats or thanks
3. You dont always have to have the last word; thank you; your welcome; I really appreciate
itno need to keep it going, cut the chord
4. Dont automatically CC someones boss if you want something to get done; give the person a
chance to do it; if they dont, then bring in the big guns
5. Dont use colorful stationary for business emails, only Elle Woods from Legally Blonde could
pull that off
6. Pay attention to the little red swiggly lines that indicate a word is spelled wrong; nuthin seys you
dont no what you are talking about like a mispeled wurd or improper use of grammer
7. Read an email in its entirety before sending; once you hit sendits too late
8. Dont recall messages; it only draws more attention to it; simply send another email with the
corrections and apologize
9. Dont send every email with the red exclamation point! If everything is important, then nothing
is!
10. Dont go overboard with signaturesno one really reads them anyway. Ive seen some with 5 to
10 hyperlinks; how much time do you think people spend at the bottom of the email?
11. If I send you an email that warrants a response; kindly do so, even if you dont have the answer
right now
12. If I send you an email with multiple questions; dont only respond to one question; Im not
asking just because I like to type
13. Dnt eml lk U txt or Twt save it for those platforms
14. DONT EMAIL IN ALL CAPS. IF I WANTED TO BE SHOUTED AT, ID STAND NEXT
TO SOMEONE WITH A MEGAPHONE
15. Dont be long winded. I have a rule thumb; if an email is longer than my handIm not reading
it. Keep it simple and get to the point; we all have 100s of emails to get through and dont want
to spend 20 minutes on your dissertation
There you have it. I hope you are not guilty of any of these; if you are; clean up your act.
J ohn Boyer is Director of Marketing for Coldwell Banker Commercial

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