For starters, we have to keep in mind that there is nothing like a face-to-face meeting. It is not possible (or even required) to meet the other party for every piece of communication we want to have. Fortunately we have electronic communication in today’s time-crunched fast paced world. With emails, we can only hope to emulate half of what we could express in person as we cannot make use of tone of voice, gestures and other expressions as well. This is only half of the problem, though.
The other half is that we tend to write solely from our point of view whereas the receiver usually has a diagonally opposite perspective. It is only human to explain one’s own side of the story (sometimes in meticulous details). The rule of thumb in any kind of inter-personal communication is to understand how it will sound at the receiving end of it.
We’ve all been at the receiving end of good and bad emails and we kind of know what works and what does not. A typical receiver gets a lot of emails and managing inbox is a task in itself for her. The higher the status of the receiver, the more similar kind of mails she gets. Usually when we write mails to somebody senior (generally not personally known or an acquaintance), we are there to pitch something. Now to get the desired response, getting in the receiver’s shoes helps. Here are some points to consider:
1. Keep the subject line clear and non-spammy.
2. Don’t keep rambling unnecessarily, stick to the point (and facts).
3. The mail should answer quickly – why should the receiver care?
4. Keep it short and simple. (As most people don’t mind responding and helping if it doesn’t take too long.)
5. Don’t oversell your point. It is human psychology that we tend to distrust when somebody tries to push something on us, even if it is beneficial to us.
6. Give a clear action point as to what the receiver is supposed to ‘do’ after reading the mail.
The most effective tool is to ask yourself these questions:
1. In the receiver’s place, would I open this mail?
2. Would I read this mail (and then in all entirety)?
3. Would I act on this mail?
Once you would like to open, read and act on the mail you wrote, there are chances that the receiver would do too!
