Want to become an email "guru"? Just ask yourself these five questions before sending each message and you're done
Whether it's a message sent to an old friend we haven't seen in a long time or a work email, the substance doesn't change: before making mistakes we might regret, we must ask ourselves questions that are as simple as they are effective. Even a veteran of e-mail, in fact, could be "surprised" and make mistakes that could compromise the clarity of the message.
It would be good and right, therefore, to stop for a moment before pressing the "Send" button (or "Reply", obviously) and adopt the habit of "self-interrogation". Initially, it may seem like a useless waste of time, but in the long run we will realize that these fateful questions improve our style and allow us to master the "medium" to perfection. In short, a sort of shortcut to writing the perfect email.
Did you write well?
The first question to ask concerns the form of our email message. Did we write everything correctly? Or are there grammatical and syntactical errors that risk making the text unreadable (as well as making us look bad). Taking a couple of minutes to reread the message and make sure there are no typos, verbs in the wrong form and tenses or expressions taken from spoken language (or text messages) will do our email good.
Are we clear?
In addition to the form, we must also look at the substance. A message that is grammatically correct but incomprehensible serves absolutely no purpose. When re-reading, make sure that each of your sentences is sufficiently clear, otherwise rephrase it so that it is perfectly understandable.
Object... of desire
Maybe it's hard to realize, but what makes the distinction between a read e-mail and an immediately trashed message is the subject of the e-mail itself. Being the "business card" of our message, it must be clear, concise and, at the same time, attractive. It must provide information about the content of the message and, at the same time, leave a halo of mystery that will encourage the recipient to open the e-mail and read it from top to bottom.
Spam yes or spam no?
The vast majority of e-mail services provide users with an anti-spam box in which all the junk mail addressed to us is automatically collected. Questo meccanismo si basa su dei filtri anti-spam in grado di riconoscere i messaggi pubblicitari e pericolosi a seconda delle frasi o del lessico utilizzato all’interno del messaggio. Se non volete essere cestinati automaticamente da questi filtri, fate attenzione alle parole che utilizzate: il rischio di non essere ricevuti e letti dal vostro destinatario è sempre molto elevato.
Si legge da smartphone?
Gran parte dei messaggi di posta elettronica viene aperto e letto attraverso lo smartphone. Quando stiamo scrivendo un messaggio, magari pensando di includere degli elementi multimediali o delle animazioni, dobbiamo chiederci se la sua formattazione è adeguata anche alla lettura da smartphone. In caso contrario, il nostro destinatario cestinerà il messaggio senza degnarci di un minimo di attenzione.
