How to Write a Pro­fes­sion­al Email: Tips & best practices

Over 300 billion emails are sent around the world every day — a large pro­por­tion of them in everyday working life. They can be quite tedious to sort through, which makes it all the more annoying if emails are poorly written or don’t even seem to have a point to them. To avoid falling into this trap, you should stick to certain rules.

How to write a business email

Writing a formal email shows pro­fes­sion­al­ism and respect for the recipient. Always write emails in a targeted manner and ensure that your text is in­for­ma­tive and well-struc­tured. Make it clear what it is about and help the recipient to un­der­stand your message. Keep your message as short as possible without coming across as curt. This makes it easier for the reader to extract the important in­for­ma­tion. In addition, you’ll save time writing and the recipient will save time reading.

In addition, you should never skimp on po­lite­ness and etiquette when writing a formal email — ad­dress­ing the recipient properly, saying please and thank you as well as a friendly sign-off at the end are a must. It is advisable to adhere to email etiquette. This will increase the chances of your email being taken seriously and answered by the recipient.

How to write an email step by step

Just like when you’re writing actual letters on paper, emails also follow a certain pattern. As all readers know and expect this standard, it makes sense to structure your digital letters ac­cord­ing­ly. This will make it easier for your recipient to get a better overview of the content.

Step 1: Subject

The subject line is one of the most fre­quent­ly misused parts of an email message. This field is supposed to be used to briefly com­mu­ni­cate the topic of the message. When correctly done, it makes it easier for re­cip­i­ents to decide whether the email needs to be read straight away or can wait until later. The in­for­ma­tion in the subject line can also be used to find and sort emails.

Here are some good examples for a subject line:

• Meeting: Project Atlas — 03/07/2022 — 10:00 to 12:00
• Your per­for­mance report for April
• Minutes and action points from your meeting — 7th May
• IT in­for­ma­tion: Update for YZ software

Note how every subject line tries to stress how the recipient is involved, how they’re part of the task, project or subject. The subject line indicates the urgency of the message for the recipient.

Con­verse­ly, you should avoid a subject line that does not mention the issue at hand, is too long, or might even be seen as passive ag­gres­sive:

• Urgent!!! (it would be a lot more effective if you wrote what the urgent issue is.)
• Request (it’s better to mention what the request is.)
• I have a few more questions following our con­ver­sa­tion in the lobby last Friday. (The text in the subject line should also be kept short.)
• Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Sunday brunch with Gary and Claudia (A long row of reply ab­bre­vi­a­tions should be reduced.)
• Are you serious?! (It’s not a good idea to start off with criticism.)

Step 2: Greeting

You start the actual text of your email with a com­bi­na­tion of greeting, ap­pre­ci­a­tion and salu­ta­tion. Even though this is such a small part of the email, many people get stuck on what to write.

How formal do I need to be?

It is better to be too formal and polite if you’re not sure how to write the email. You are always on the safe side with “Dear First name Last name,”. This is the right choice, es­pe­cial­ly if you are ad­dress­ing strangers. The classic “Dear Mr. /Mrs. / Ms. …,” is fine if they’ve chosen to be called that. If you already know the person you are writing to a bit better, you can also use “Dear First name,” or a friendly “Good morning/afternoon/evening,” at the beginning of your email. A “Hello,” or “Hi,” is only ac­cept­able between good friends or col­leagues.

Which titles belong in the salu­ta­tion?

If they have a pro­fes­sion­al title that they’ve specified, use that instead — “Dear Dr./Professor/Pastor/Officer …,”.

If an email has multiple re­cip­i­ents, then naturally all must be addressed at the head of the text. If the amount of people you are writing to is fewer than five then the best option is to include all of them:

• Dear Mr. Murphy, Ms. Smith, Mrs. Jones, Mr. Malone, and Ms. Lit­tle­wood,

Or for internal or familiar parties:

• Dear Matthew, Mary, Sharon, Cedric, and Bianca,

If the number of re­cip­i­ents exceeds five then you should probably opt for “Dear all,” or a common de­part­ment title if they’re all members (such as “Dear engineers,”).

Whose name should I write first?

If you are writing to several people in your email, all of them need to be addressed. It doesn’t usually matter too much which order you put the re­cip­i­ents in, but it’s not unusual for people higher up in the hierarchy to be mentioned first. If the re­cip­i­ents are on the same level, you could always arrange them al­pha­bet­i­cal­ly.

What if I’m not sure of the recipient’s gender?

If you’re unsure of a client’s gender or preferred form of address, do not guess. The correct form of address is their full name ⁠— “Dear Pat Jones”. If you later learn their preferred title, make a note and start using it in the next email.

Step 3: In­tro­duc­tion

This is a short, polite tran­si­tion into the main section of the message. It’s best to keep these in­tro­duc­to­ry words as short as possible, because you don’t want to waste the reader’s time, or your own when writing the email. Depending on the situation, there are several ways to write the in­tro­duc­tion to a business email:

• I am writing to apply for the ad­ver­tised position in your Human Resources de­part­ment.
• Did you have an enjoyable vacation?
• Thanks so much for your speedy response.
• We met at the industry con­ven­tion last week, and I promised to get in touch!
• I really enjoyed your pre­sen­ta­tion on XYZ.

The purpose of the in­tro­duc­tion is to put the person being addressed in a happier mood. You should try to avoid stan­dard­ized or mean­ing­less phrases and focus more on the person. Questions about their vacation or whether they got home ok after a meeting shows that you are really in­ter­est­ed in the other person. However, you can also use the in­tro­duc­tion to lead into the topic (like in a job ap­pli­ca­tion), to introduce yourself, or to briefly revisit a previous con­ver­sa­tion.

Step 4: Body of the message

This is the core of the email. The aim is to com­mu­ni­cate your message as clearly as possible. The priority should be for the reader to un­der­stand the in­for­ma­tion ef­fi­cient­ly and correctly. So there are certain guide­lines to keep in mind when writing a business email:

• Short sentences: Every sentence should have a point to it. Lots of sub­or­di­nate clauses and awkwardly con­struct­ed sentences disrupt the flow of reading.
• Using bold and italics: Em­pha­siz­ing in­for­ma­tion in your text with bold and italics allows the reader to find the most important facts and figures more easily. The rule is not to use bold or italics for more than one word or group of words per sentence.
• Sensible para­graphs: Para­graphs give your text structure. Build your email in a way that makes the context easily rec­og­niz­able. Try to limit each paragraph to three sentences when possible.
• Lists: These allow you to present sta­tis­tics and facts in a compact manner. Dates for a meeting, costs for an upcoming project, par­tic­i­pants on the next trip, etc. The most important in­for­ma­tion should be able to be seen at a glance every time the email is opened.
• Simple vo­cab­u­lary: Avoid making things more com­pli­cat­ed than they are. Use basic words that everyone can un­der­stand. Naturally more complex vo­cab­u­lar­ies are used for sci­en­tif­ic and in-depth subjects, or if you are ex­chang­ing emails with experts within your field of expertise.
• Con­struc­tive tone: The reader should absorb the message in a positive way and take the desired action as a result. So use friendly language when writing your pro­fes­sion­al email. If you find yourself being critical, make sure to keep it con­struc­tive. Focus on what can be improved. If you want something, avoid being negative and demanding.

Step 5: Ending

If you want to write a pro­fes­sion­al email well, you should have a well-rounded con­clu­sion at the end of it. Include a call to action or leave the recipient with a positive im­pres­sion after they’ve read it:

• If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact me by phone or email.
• I look forward to getting to know you better.
• Further in­for­ma­tion can be found on our/my website.
• I hope to hear from you soon.
• Hope you have a great weekend.

Step 6: Closing sentence

The closing sentence is just as important as the greeting at the beginning of an email. It expresses your ap­pre­ci­a­tion for the reader. Friend­li­ness and po­lite­ness are also a top priority here, but don’t overdo it. Nobody ends their business emails with extra re­spect­ful greetings these days. “Best regards”, on the other hand, is the safest option, but not nec­es­sar­i­ly the best, as it comes across as very stale. With a personal note you leave a much more positive im­pres­sion:

• Best wishes from sunny Boston,
• Regards to everyone in Chicago,
• Have a great week,
• Hope you have a lovely vacation,

Note that these closing remarks are followed by a comma to prepare for your signature.

Enjoy your free time over the holidays,

Best wishes,

Noel Harris

Step 7: Signature

At the very end of the email, you provide the recipient with your correct title and contact in­for­ma­tion so that they can respond in a pro­fes­sion­al manner, if need be. Our article “How to optimize your email signature” explains in detail what in­for­ma­tion you need to provide and how the content of the signature differs in business and private emails.

Step 8: At­tach­ments

Only send an at­tach­ment if you really have to and try to keep the file size as small as possible. Email inboxes have a limited storage space, and many people now read emails on the move. This means that with mobile data transfer, large at­tach­ments can only be down­loaded very slowly or not at all. You should therefore limit your at­tach­ments to a total size of 5 MB. Anything larger than this should only be sent on request, or a link should be provided to a location where the files are stored.

A business email example

The following example contains all the points you should bear in mind when writing a pro­fes­sion­al email. For more tips and tricks, it’s worth taking a look at the article “Business email templates”.

Subject: In­vi­ta­tion to “XYZ” Workshop, 11/24/23

Dear Dr. Miller,

Thank you for the pleasant and extremely in­for­ma­tive dis­cus­sion last week.

As I mentioned, we have organized a workshop on the same topic. The final details have been confirmed and I would now like to formally invite you to the event.

• 11/24/23
• 10am – 4pm
• Large con­fer­ence room (on the first floor of our building)

Catering will be provided and at the moment, we are an­tic­i­pat­ing ap­prox­i­mate­ly 28 par­tic­i­pants.

We would also like to invite you to be one of our speakers. If you would be in­ter­est­ed in speaking at our event, please get in touch with us as soon as possible.

I hope to see you at the event.

Best regards,

Peter Smith

Human Resources

Example Ltd.

557 Laurel Hurst Ct

Ogden, UT 84401

Phone: (801) 747-9224

Email: psmith@exampleltd.com

www.exampleltd.com

What was done right in this email?

• The subject line is specific and short.
• The greeting is ap­pro­pri­ate for the occasion, and the recipient is addressed properly (with doctor title).
• The in­tro­duc­tion makes a friendly reference to the previous con­ver­sa­tion.
• The main body has several para­graphs, and the most important data is presented in a list.
• A call to action is in­cor­po­rat­ed into the con­clu­sion.
• The greeting at the end is friendly and per­son­al­ized.
• The signature contains all the in­for­ma­tion the recipient may need.
• No un­nec­es­sary at­tach­ment was included.

Dos and don’ts when writing a pro­fes­sion­al email