You may not be working in publishing, for example, but this does not exempt you from writing clearly! When you include gratuitous–or even minor– grammatical and spelling errors, your intentions can be misconstrued and you definitely will end up looking unprofessional.
Double negatives = Is this person serious?
2. Not addressing someone correctly. If somebody signs an email to you with their first name, then, in that case, and only in that case, it may be appropriate to address them in a similar fashion. On the flip side, if a person sends an email using their whole name (Mr. Mike Jones), then you should address them similarly. On another note, if a person addresses you by your first name, you can assume it is safe to address them in a similar way (for example: Hi Lisa). You can never be too careful. There are some uptight folk out there!
3. Unnecessary exclamation points and emoticons. There is literally nothing worse than losing professional credibility when you’re just trying to be nice. Certain professionals will see you as emotional or excitable and somewhat frivolous. Boo. While a flat-tone in email can come off as stern or even angry, it is certainly the safe bet.
Consider selecting one sentence with which to use exclamation points–because sprinkling them everywhere just looks like you’re not taking yourself seriously.
4. Cursive script, background colors and colored font, with a highly decorative email signature. Great news: We do not live in 1999, which means you do not have to take advantage of every single option on the computer (or in your Outlook settings) just because it exists. No, your name in large, purple script is not okay.
A clean, short and concise email signature in white and black is all that is necessary.
5. Hitting reply-all. When you hit reply-all by mistake, it works like this: Someone notices that they received an email that doesn’t regard them and they make a joke about it to their cubicle partner. Then, that person makes a joke about it to another person and suddenly you look like you don’t know how to handle The Internet.
We all know that’s not true, so do your best to exclude the whole office from your personal responses. On the other hand, please do hit reply-all if you mean to respond to a group. This can otherwise cause major email miscommunications.
6. Consistently marking your messages urgent. Seriously, it’s not that serious.
7. Long, drawn-out philosophical quotes. This is also pretty annoying–especially when you contact the same people over and over. A Thoreau quote does not make you look any more intelligent, we swear.