How to Write a Professional Email #3

Lesson 3: The Proper Use of the "Send" feature

You may think this lesson is unnecessary; of course you know how to use the send feature! I would like to offer a dissenting opinion. It's sort of like chess, you know how all the pieces move but you certainly don't know how to "play." Most people know how to click on the "send" button, but how many people really know how to properly send an email? It really consists of three things:

1. Proper Email Composition (Covered in the other lessons)
2. Selection of recipient and proper data entry
3. Submission to the internet

Many people consider themselves finished when they have accomplished #1 and commit only one of their three brain cells to the completion of #2 and #3. Take heed! Many fatal mistakes occur during these last steps!

Not being careful about who you send email to can potentially lead to your immediate and involuntary loss of employment, downward spiral into substance abuse, and premature death. Not to mention the acid reflux, which will be enough to make Tums stock go up half a point. Let's examine the strange phenomenon of "misspelling an email address and getting mad when you don't get a reply."

It's pretty common for somebody to tell you their email address incorrectly on the phone, misspell it in a BlackBerry text message, or intentionally give you the wrong one when you ask them on a date. Regardless of why it occurs, it's really your responsibility to get your message to them, not theirs. Always make sure you get two pieces of contact information if you require a relationship with that person. But that's not really the issue here is it?

The problem is when you know perfectly well what their email address is, and by not carefully rereading it before clicking send, you send it to the wrong person (or to nobody at all). Subsequently, once a reasonable amount of time goes by, say 3 days for business emails or 5 minutes for the person you're stalking, you send this angry message to the correct address:

"Hey, I really needed a reply to my message from yesterday. Why do you always take so long? Is it too much to ask for one simple email reply? What's your problem? Do you want to take this outside? You always were such a jerk!"

Not only will the person have no idea what you are talking about, they will also get upset and probably kick your butt in the parking lot. Always check the "sent" folder and make sure the email address was correct in the email that was never received. You have no reason to get mad unless they really didn't respond! Also, you could try sending emails with a return receipt request, although that usually annoys the person on the receiving end.

A certain dishonest behavior deserves honorable mention here, the sneaky pretend misspelling. "Oh you didn't get my email? I must have spelled the address wrong. Let me resend it." You know what I'm talking about. It's just like "Oh you didn't get my term paper that I had all semester to work on but supposedly turned in at the last possible minute? Let me give it to you now with the understanding that I turned it in on time, even though it's two weeks later and I never followed up with you to make sure you got it. Please ignore the file date that says I finished it at 2 am last night." People are stupid, but not that stupid. I would wager that every time somebody claims "The internet ate my email," they are full of crap. Admitting that you forgot to send it and apologizing is always better then trying to outsmart somebody, who knows better anyway.