Email Etiquette Tips, Tricks and Secrets

The rules of email etiquette are not "rules" in the sense that I will come after you if you don't follow them. They are guidelines that help avoid mistakes (like offending someone when you don't mean to) and misunderstandings (like being offended when you're not meant to). These core rules of email etiquette help us communicate better via email.

Learn how to use email without offending anybody, how to format your messages, the right way to reply and forward, and a lot more in lessons coming to you comfortably — via email.

"Re:" means "Reply:" and should only be used in replies.

Make sure recipients can open the attachments you send them by agreeing on their format beforehand.

Don't send personal messages to millions. Double-check where you send your email, especially when you reply to a mailing list message.

Don't clog email systems without permission.

"Me too" is not enough content, but too much annoyance.

I'll see you 020301, right? Here's how to avoid confusion about dates in emails.

Avoid embarrassing emails by sending them to yourself only (by default).

No, really! I mean it. Honestly!

Make sure the links in your emails work. Punctuation around URLs can interfere with that.

One exclamation mark is certainly enough!! This cannot be stressed enough.

New ideas are better ideas. If you read all replies to a particular message on a mailing list before replying yourself, you can avoid repeating something that's already been said.

Forwarding emails is a great way of sharing ideas, but make sure the original idea is not hidden in obfuscation.

Dear Ms., Mrs. and Mr. Reader... fortunately, emails can often do without titles and names.

Did the spam filter eat my message? Spare others this nagging question and let them know you got their email.

"Reply" is good. "Reply to All" is better. Right?

Email hoaxes often contain stories that are intriguing, and sure to irritate. Here's how to spot and stop urban legends.

You don't want to be a spammer, do you? Replying to spam that appears on a mailing list may make you look like one, though.

Everything you mail will be used against you.

Share emails by forwarding them in a smart and efficient manner.

Share the full message and the full contents in a clean way, but don't disclose other recipient's email addresses.

You can often find typos or misplaced commas neither your spelling checker nor you yourself catch when proofreading on the screen.

If you need to type characters nowhere to be found on your keyboard, Mac OS X provides comfortable ways to find and insert them in your emails.

Do you want to include some French in your emails, spell a name or place properly or discuss old Chinese writings maybe? Here's how to include foreign language characters in your messages using Windows.

End email conversations without unnecessary "Thank You" and "You're welcome" notes that are more annoying than nice.

Make your email replies easy to read and understand by quoting in a smart and useful manner.

Message for you, you, you, and you. If you send an email to multiple recipients, make sure you enter them correctly.

Make sure you don't send messages from 1981.

Make sure you're not spreading worms and viruses via email or act as a vehicle for spreading spam. All this can be caused by malicious emails. Fortunately, there's protection.

Hint at formatting smartly in the plain text email you write and have it rendered as rich text in supporting email programs while the message still looks good to everyone else. Here's how to employ Markdown formatting in your emails.

Do you make these mistakes in your email subjects? (The key to getting your messages read is not to be clever.)

Do not intimidate recipients with too much text.

"Signature" is a synonym for brief and unobtrusive — or at least it should be, because overly long signatures in emails are an annoyance.

Come visit me, everybody! Unless you want everybody and the whole world to know where you live, don't include your street address in your email signature.

Do you think quoting original text in your email replies perfectly is a lot of work? Don't let the '>' intimidate you! Here's a very comfortable, relaxed, quick and still clean and compatible way to reply properly.

Comma, colon, hyphen and semicolon — all exist for a reason: they make it easier to understand the intended meaning of a sentence. Don't make life more difficult and possibly less interesting for the recipients of your emails. Pay some — though not too pedantically much — attention to punctuation.

Share the message, not email addresses when forwarding an email.

The Subject line of your emails is important, but you shouldn't rely on it being read or paid attention.

Let recipients reply when (ever) they want.

When your photos look good in your email, you look good, too! Here's how to make sure your images are not larger than screens and mailboxes by resizing them in style — online and for free.

What is okay here may be an affront there. Customs differ from mailing list to mailing list, and you should respect each.

You made a mistake, if I'm not mistaken. Pointing out email etiquette mistakes in public is not very polite and a bit annoying — an email etiquette faux pas, so to speak.

Don't use smileys to say something you should not (and don't intend to) say in emails.

Don't send anything you don't want to send.

Help make the world less confusing. Try to talk about one subject per message only. For another subject, start a new email.

Waach prablym? (The problem that you are so difficult to read.)

It's never off-topic to state when your message is.

DYK? Not everybody knows every acronym, and they don't save that much time anyway.

Put a bold face onto your plain text. Here's how to make simple text stand out among its peers by mimicking bold face in plain text emails.

Bullet points make your emails *easier to read and *easier to reply to.

You have the future, and the present of humankind in your hands — even when you just write an email.

Emphasize text the Italian way in your emails by italicizing passages and words, even when you write using plain text only.

Messageswithhardlyanywhitespacearedifficulttodecipher.

Choose wisely when creating a new email address and help avoid email address case confusion.

Sign your signature correctly by employing the standard signature delimiter in your emails.

Do you often (want to) say something without quite saying it? Say something just to be able to take it back? Here's a handy shortcut for doing that in emails, and a way to communicate Freudian slippers, too.

The problem that whatever can be misinterpreted will indeed be misunderstood is not unique to email, but with email it is uniquely severe.

If you don't know how to say good-bye at the end of an email, there's one thing that will almost always be appropriate. Thanks.

Not everybody can receive your fancily formatted emails. Some may even react furious. To be safe rather than sorry, send plain text emails only when in doubt.

Without a line sub-scripted "sign here", how do you decide where to place your email signature? Look here.

Smaller is more beautiful, at least when it comes to email attachments. So make files smaller before your send them via email.

Tell it like it is. Have you notices how people who you understand perfectly well when you listen to them become cryptic when they start writing?

Make your messages a joy to read by ensuring your lines are short and sweet.

Don't shout in your emails (and all caps is so difficult to read).