4 Proven Strategies to Be More Influential Through Email (Part Two)

first two concepts here. 3. Keep emails conversational, but still fact-based. Today’s email is less and less formal—but recognize there’s no need to be unprofessional just because you are conversational. Tim Elmore, founder and president of Growing Leaders is an expert on leading young generations that have grown up in the digital age. He summarizes how email can be tricky when it comes to articulating our desired tone of voice. “Email content is devoid of any nonverbal cue, tone of voice or facial expression,” he explained to us. When in doubt, be sure to clarify. As with all forms of digital communication—from Twitter to group chat, if it can be misinterpreted, you can count on it being misunderstood, or just plain confusing. “People tend to jump to the negative if there is no clear positive slant to the perceived message, so communicating via email requires specific attention to the word choice and manner to which the information is presented,” Tim said. Keeping the recipient in mind, be intentional as you use language that keeps emails as fact-based as possible. At Edoc, we save more sensitive topics, or those that can easily be misinterpreted, for video conferencing, a phone call, or a face-to-face meeting. 4. Write for the mobile reader who is likely to share your email.  You’ve now written your email request—no generic subject line here! And now you are ready to write an email that sounds similar in syntax and diction to how you speak. Knowing that your reader is often skim-reading your email, I often utilize 3-5 bullet points to quickly tell my readers the vital information. These are easy for an on-the-go or mobile reader to quickly digest, and they typically force you to be concise, and action-oriented as you create your email. Write for more than just the intended recipient. It still holds true to craft your original email to accommodate a certain set of readers that you knew (or hoped!) would be reading your email. But because so many people are inundated with email, or accessing it on-the-go, write so that your entire conversation thread can always be shared with others. And by shared, we mean someone hitting the forward button—and making no tweaks to the body of your message. Since this happens so often, assume no one will filter or translate your words when they do hit “forward.” (And yes, it is true—they might not remove aspects that are not project-related.) Let your emails keep working in your favor after you send. Have you ever been in a situation where you worked with one main point of contact, who would then pass along information to the rest of the team as needed? In this setup, it’s essential to craft your email so that a project manager doesn’t have to do any additional work once they have received your message! You make their life easier by intentionally writing an email they can effortlessly pass along to their other team members. It might mean a little more work for you. You may have to include in your email, a recap of something that was discussed on video conference or on the phone, but in the long-run, those kind of follow-up notes are beneficial from a project management perspective anyway. The benefit is this: you ensure that your message is delivered as intended, and you often speed things up while doing so. It may be time for group chat.  The volume of emails we receive can be daunting. The average worker is sending almost 1,000 emails at work each month. Depending on how time-sensitive the bulk of your email is, one of the most effective ways to manage your team’s communication is through group chat. It allows for those necessary, short and quick discussions, it’s searchable, and it allows you to be concise by design. One way we reduce the time we invest in emails is through Campfire Chat. How about you: do you use iChat, instant message, or another web-based chat platform Let us know. [caption id="attachment_714" align="alignleft" width="150"] Kim Sykes[/caption] READ MORE: If you liked this post, you might like “The Team Culture” Kim Sykes is a marketer and content creator at Edoc Service, Inc., a total virtual company. ]]>