Writing Emails People Will Actually Read

by Dan Hutson on May 7, 2009

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photo by psd

Despite the persistent predictions that email is not long for this world, those of us who actually live in this world continue to be plagued by it. So until the bell finally tolls for e, we all need to do a better job of writing emails people will actually read.

David Silverman recently wrote that the average email requires anywhere from two to 50 revisions (depending on the audience) before it’s ready for dissemination. In theory it may sound reasonable to expect someone to edit an email 40 or 50 times when it’s going out to thousands of employees, but I guarantee you it doesn’t happen with most emails in most organizations.

That said, Silverman does share a great checklist to consider when making those theoretical revisions. You’ll find it here. This is another one to print out and stick near your computer.

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{ 2 comments }

Dan Hutson May 12, 2009 at 5:12 pm

Hi Ryan. Thanks for the thoughtful comments. Sorry for singling you out among those discussing the imminent death of email, but I thought yours was one of the more interesting discussions and wanted to point my three or four readers in your direction.

Frankly, the day we say goodbye to email can’t come soon enough for me. It has been so abused and misused over the years; I’m ready to move on to the Next Killer App, whatever that may be.

Glad you’re enjoying my blog. I’ve got yours in my RSS feed.

Dan

Ryan May 12, 2009 at 5:00 pm

Hi Dan–

Glad you’re reading my blog, but I feel like you set me up a little unfairly here as a relatively unthoughtful hyperbolist. I’d argue that I was, in fact, hyperbolizing relatively thoughtfully!

Maybe my dose of tongue-in-cheek could have been done better, but in any case I agree with your points here–email is a form that requires craftsmanship to do well, and it is by no means about to disappear.

My point about email’s demise is more future-oriented: It’s clearly not the best tool for the job any more, but as entrenched as it is it will take some time to supplant–and in the meantime interim solutions need to be interoperable with it.

Enjoying your blog! Keep it up, but please treat your straw men fairly, we have feelings.

Regards,
Ryan

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