How to improve your email etiquette

Change the subject line every time you start a new conversation: really true. Too much times there are mails "re-used" that only confuse the receiver and after some periods also the sender who needs them.
Don’t use email when another medium makes more sense. : email is abused. Though I admit email is fast, IMHO sometimes a call is more effective (think of those crowded in-boxes where your email will reside
Answer questions inline. : If possible and makes sense, otherwise use bulleting and paragraphs to clarify
Don’t get the last word in. : email should be fast, synthetic and effective, no reason to go on with cheers when email objective is reached
Use the cc function sparingly. : and use it wisely. Same thing for BCC. Put people in an order (alphabetic sorting with clients first for me makes sense)
Keep it brief. : true and avoid nested sentences, Is better to have a list than a long spare text.
Ask whether people prefer attachments or inline pasting.: or if it makes sense. Sometimes people think that the all the receivers are in office and attach 20 mb of attachments while you're on the road with in-boxes not so easily manageable
Give up cutesy handles. : or at least limit them to your personal writing.
Use personal email for personal correspondence.: true all times
Say no to chain letters and jokes. : see above

I know this thread is old but....

I am in the military and we have HIGHLY developed rules for email and many of them are the opposite of what is suggested here.

BCC: - We refer to BCC: as "screw mail." You are sending an email and keeping secret who else knows. Not nice. In some organizations BCC: is disabled.

Reply to All - REQUIRED in some instances. The difference is that we rarely send emails to anyone who does not really need to know. Well, let me qualify that - non idiots keep the TO: and CC: limited to the right folks. By not replying to all you are cutting someone out without their knowledge. They could end up doing/saying something stupid because they didn’t know where the action had gone.

TO: and CC: - Very important to put the right people in the right place. If someone is significantly senior to you or your boss there are very few reasons to CC: them.

Inline Response - Normally mixed - quote the portion you are answering but always leave the entire message the other person sent. Context matters.

Just another take on the "rules."

A month ago I was sent a mailing about some work related event, with an pdf attachment of more than 2 MB in size. Besides the bland misuse of other people's mailbox, I know several people whose mailbox size is limited to 20 MB. It's fine to send attachments in mailings, but limit the size to 400 kB max.

I can't stand it when people send around "advice" emails... like the cops in blah blah blah have been on the lookout for X killer... he'll only attack ladies with brown hair shoving big macs in their faces at 2pm in the Dallas area, and he uses the date rape drug called Iwanascrue... so send this to all the ladies in your contact list to warn them, and also send it to all the men so they can warn their ladies. Send it to everyone you know, because even if they live in Egypt they may still know someone who lives in Dallas, and it's on you're head if you don't. OH MY GOD. It drives me nuts... and what's worse is that it usually comes from people who really do think they're being helpful by sending out this advice... Snopes.com people... check it out. if it sounds too good to be true, or if someone's life is going to be saved/changed b/c of your email... check it out on snopes first. It's likely a hoax. Bill Gates isn't going to share his fortune with you, so spare the rest of your contact list, and you'll save yourself from looking like a gullible idiot.

Be cautious of sending email to the wrong person with a similar name.

STOP USING REPLY ALL!!! (Caps on because I am SCREAMING!!) I work in an office at a university with four (non-techie) ladies, and we routinely get blanket emails from higher administration. These are the emails addressed to ALL the people in a department, departments, or particular campus.

I hate it when I get FOUR copies of the same email, because these folks saw the information and instead of either looking at the recipients to see if who they are sending the email to are listed, just forward it on. So THREE of the people in the office send the same email to each other EVERY D@MN time! Drives me crazy!!

Secondly, about the REPLY ALL...STOP IT! 99% of the time it is completely unnecessary!! I'm not sure if these folks are doing this because they want everyone else in the office to KNOW what their reply is, or what.

I have tried to explain the difference to reply and reply all, but it falls on deaf ears. Boss sends out email stating that she is going to be out of the office for the next two hours. I get three emails REPLY ALL: OK we will take care of things... I don't need any more email!!

WHEW! Man it felt great to get that off of my chest! NO I'm not wound too tight, or over stressed or any of that. I just feel that email is more for communicating than 'thinking out loud'.

The infamous reply all when all the sender has to say is "Yes", "LOL". I hate that!

One thing which I find really irritating is invitation from all variety of social networking sites. So, in case someone's joining facebook or any such site, they shouldn't send out mass invitation to all their mailing list.

Please don't use "stationery" for your email. Or animated images in your signatures. Or multiple colors/fonts/point sizes ... or anything else that makes me think that, if possible in email, you would sign your name with a smiley face over the "i"!

Signatures!

Leave in your contact info and nothing else. No fancy company logo, no "Think of the trees, don't print this e-mail", no "If you're not the intended recipient of this e-mail, do not read it, delete it and act like you never received it or I'm going to sue you". I don't care and your signature wont keep me from forwarding your intimate photos to the whole world if you can't tell my name from your wife's.

Email disclaimers are my pet peeve and they are particularly a bane of professional communication. They are of zero legal effect and are just wasted electrons (and of trees if the email needs to be printed). Financial services firms are the worst - I have seen one disclaimer that extended to three block paragraphs of "this is not a financial offer" boilerplate. Makes it very difficult to read a chain wading through that gumph. Law firms aren't much better.

My wife and I have had a shared email account for the past 14 years for general emails of concern to both of us, so I don't agree with prohibition on shared accounts. We each have our own individual email accounts for both personal and business purposes, but there are matters that the other might need to be aware of which go to the shared account. For correspondence with family or collaboration on family projects such as our biannual family reunion, it's helpful to have everything go into (or come from) one email address that we both can use. It also helps with correspondence with the businesses with which we do business. We don't have to worry about logging into the other person's email account just to check whether an order has shipped or to get a confirmation number or some such thing. Shared email addresses aren't necessarily bad.

Hey B.J.!

I'm in the printing industry, and you're absolutely right. Sometimes "more" is needed in work correspondence.

In general, though, great tips Marci!
~Peace

This goes along with the reminder to use the right medium:

If you receive an e-mail indicating a lack of understanding or concurrence, DO NOT add to an ever-escalating string of e-mails. The rule I give my employees: Don't be the second person to display annoyance. Pick up the dang phone and CALL the person, or walk over and SPEAK to her!

Some pet peeves I'd want to add to the list:

1. NO HTML. E-mail is a TEXT medium. If you need to send something formatted, send it as an attachment--BUT:

2. Don't send attachments unless they're really necessary. Nothing more annoying than getting a message that says "Please read the attached memo"--and then you wait for Word or Acrobat Reader to open the memo to find that it contains one paragraph of text that could easily have been in the body of the e-mail.

3. When you do need to send an attachment, make it as universal as possible. Not everyone in the world uses Word, and certainly not everyone has the latest version. Even if your recipient has the same software as you, your custom fonts may turn to gibberish on your recipient's computer. Use the least complicated, most universal solution that will work for what you need to communicate; I prefer simple text, PDF and RTF in that order.

4. Contrary to the opinions of many, putting the message you're replying to at the bottom of your message is NOT in fact the universally accepted "right" way. Indeed, it was basically invented by Outlook--need I say more? This approach may be useful if all you need is to make the original message available to someone cc'd who might not have gotten the original, but if you're actually trying to respond to a message, post the relevant (short) portion above your reply.

5. Use a professional writing style, good grammar, spelling, punctuation, etc. The message can be brief without being unprofessional. This is especially important when writing a colleague, employer, employee, teacher/professor, etc.

Nice list. When I write longer emails I make use of bold sub-sections to provide clarity. I think of them as inline subject lines. This allows a reader to quickly scan my email for content and context. When writing within these sub-sections I keep them short and to the point. I find that people are more likely to read my email if I make it easy for them absorb. Thanks.

This is an issue I didn’t see listed above.

I manage grants and accounts for a nonprofit foundation and I can't tell you how many reports and communications I receive that aren't even addressed to me! No "Hello MP, Good Afternoon Mp etc." It drives me nuts! Likewise, emails that end without a person signing their name or saying thank you etc. Don't go over the top, but be professional. I always try to respond in such a manner that will give the recipient a "hint." The majority of the time I am communicating with people via email; they (other nonprofits) are asking me (the nonprofit I work for) for money, resources, and/or other help. I remember those with bad email etiquette, and frankly their chances of receiving help plummet with every inappropriate exchange. If they can’t manage a professional conversation, how are they going to manage several thousand dollars etc?

You made the point about changing the subject line when starting a new conversation, but that's actually a bad practice. When starting a new conversation, you should start a brand new mail and _not_ do it by replying to an existing mail. If you reply to an existing mail then your mail will contain headers which link the new mail to the old mail and in email programs which support a threaded view the new (completely unrelated) mail will still be attached to the old conversation.

For a new conversation start a new mail.

My only bad habit is being wordy. However, it comes from a desire to provide all the needed information. And, I detest sentences that are nothing but abbreviated phases. If I'm emailing for a printing quote and I request it the way most people would and only say "I need a price on 5000 full color, letter-size flyers," then I guarantee there'll be a reply asking if I'll need a bleed; a third email asking what weight and finish of stock do I want; and a fourth about what turn-around do I need; maybe more. So, I try to list all the specs in as few words as possible.
I know most people want to read about 8 words and move on, but it wastes more time to email back and forth 5 times. Just read my first email and you'll have it all. I even get responses that thank me for being so thorough. I often get, "Thanks for all the necessities. I should be able to get you your quote ASAP."
Also, thanks for pointing out the stationary and animation. I hate getting emails that do not look like business communications. I'm always afraid the boss will walk by and think I'm goofing off.

There's a big difference between work email and personal email. I agree that with work email, short, sweet and to the point and very plain is the best. But if I'm doing a personal email to friends and family. I'm going to be me and that may include stationary and whatever else I think will liven up my email. If you don't like it. Ask to be taken off my email list and I will be happy to do that for you. When I read the article it sounded, to me anyway, that it was geared more toward the work email.