1.

Hi everybody,

welcome to our course, Write Professional Emails in English. Since this is our first lesson, we'll

take the basic parts of a professional email and focus on some thing you should

do and somethings you should avoid. By the end of this lesson, you'll have a good understanding of
how

a basic English email is organized. The first thing I want you to

think about is your current email, what does it look like? Is it business appropriate? In other words, is
this an email

you can use when applying for a new job, or

making an important business contact? So, here's your first do. Make sure you have an email
address

that is professional looking. My personal one looks something like this,

but I know it's not suitable for business communication. So I use my work email. You'll notice my first
and

last name in the email. I recommend that you

have one similar to this. You don't have to include

your full name but something that readers can easily

verify as you should be fine. Now, let's look a little bit at the four

basic of an email and how to write them. These four are subject line, the greeting,

the email text and the closing. This may seem overly simple but

looking at each part and examining it closely is

well worth the effort. We always write a subject

line our heading, this is the first we always

do when writing an email. It should introduce the topic of

the email and get readers mind's focus. Let's look at a couple of examples. In our first example the
topic is unclear. These show the reader exactly

why you're emailing them. The subject line should be as clear and

as specific as possible. Try to imagine that you

are receiving an email, which subject line has

the clearest message? Now, here's something I

don't want you to do. Don't forget about the basics of writing

in English, like spelling things correctly, and getting your grammar,

punctuation, and capitalization right. Paying attention to this starts

even at the subject line. We will go over this in more

detail later in the module. Next comes the greeting. Greeting should be formal and

not too familiar. If you are certain about at a few details

of your reader, this makes things easier. For instance, if the reader is a man,

then call him as Ms. Alvarez in the greeting seem strange. You laugh. But I've had students
addressed emails

to me after meeting me in class, mind you, and still call me Mrs. Landers. Mrs. Landers was my
mother's name and

it certainly can't be used to refer to me. If you are not absolutely certain,

use titles that are gender nonspecific. This means greeting them without

referring to their gender. Look for a person's position at

the company, university or office, if possible, and

mention that in the greeting. For instance, dear Professor Lee,

or dear Director Smith. If gender is the only information

you have about the reader, then dear sir or dear madam will work. Some people use to whom it may
concern. I've used this on letters of

recommendation for students. You can also use it if you are addressing

a company, like FedEx, a bank or an airline. If you're addressing a group,

you could use greetings like these. Now let's turn to the email text, which is

the third but largest part of your email, because it includes the main message and

all necessary details. Here's another don't. You aren't writing a book here

avoid long emails all together. You want the reader to read all of

your texts so you should only include important information, essential details

but remain brief and to the point. If possible, keep the email texts
to one or two paragraphs and no paragraph should be more than three for

four sentences long. If you're asking your reader to do

something for you, keep that to one or two requests. I tell my students this all the time. Another
thing I want you to avoid Is

sounding like you are complaining or blaming your reader. This puts the reader on the defensive, it
makes them less likely to

do what you're asking of them. If you ask about something that is

incomplete, a trick I use is what I call, self blaming. For instance, if your email is an order or

an application that has not gotten a response your email should say something

like perhaps my order was incomplete or perhaps I left something out of my package

rather than complain about the situation. And here's something I always want you

to do, always add a word to thanks, if you make a request for information or action your asking
somebody

to do something for you. Even if it's their job to do it, no busy person likes to feel like

you don't appreciate their effort. The final part of

an email is your closing. This is very short and simple. Just add regards or

best regards and leave it at that. This is a professional email so

no more than that is needed. This is followed by the signature,

your first and last name only, no title, just your name. Add any contact information your reader

will need to communicate with you. They already have your email address, but if they need anything
else To

easily contact you, put in here. Finally, I would like to

add a word of caution here. This is our last don't. Never address your email to your

reader until you have written it and checked it over, considering all

that we've been over in this lesson. It's too easy to hit send by accident

before you've carefully considered how it will sound and read at the other end. Wait until the very
last

to add the email address. And now for our final do. Take culture into consideration. A lot of the
information you'll get

through this course is based on North American standards. However, not all cultures
communicate in the same way. Would people in Japan have same style

of writing as people in France? So the last check you must

do before sending an email is to consider how your reader might

understand what you've written. We will look closer at

this in our final module. So, let's review what we've

learned in this lesson. First, there are four parts to

a professionally written email, the subject line, the greeting,

the email text, and the closing. And here are our do's and dont's. Do have a professional email. Do
make your subject line very clear and

brief. Do add words of appreciation and do consider cultural differences

between you and your reader. Now don't forget about spelling,

grammar, punctuation and capitalization. Don't write a book. Email texts should be limited to one

to two paragraphs and two requests. Don't complain or blame. Don't address the email until it is

written and checked carefully for all the things

 2. g

Hi, and welcome to this lesson on

organization, style, and editing choices. Getting these parts right can make your

professional emails easy to read and understand. How many times have you opened an email,

and it's confusing to read? Maybe it's poorly organized, sometimes

it's so full of unnecessary information that it's difficult to decide

what's important about the email. Now that you have the basic elements of an

email, I want to focus on how to be sure that the information you

include is brief and clear. That way the reader can understand,

and respond if necessary. First, let's look at

the value of being brief. People often try to put too much

information into what they write. Therefore, it's important that you

carefully think about your most important elements in your message. Here's the quote that can keep
us

focused on how to write emails. A wise woman once said, writing is 1% inspiration and

99% elimination. Have you ever thought about

what it means to be cool? Not cool as opposed to hot, but cool, as in people you want to be

around and do things with them. I have thought about this a lot, why? At times, people thought of
me as cool. Other times, not so much. I wondered, why? What people often see as cool is when

other people look original and different. Now, not everybody thinks the same people

are cool, but that's the common element. When you decide to just be yourself

without worrying about what others think, that's when you begin to be cool. How does this apply to
email? The best way to write, and remain brief

is to stick to your own words and your own message. Be sure you say only what is needed. When
you use unnecessary words,

you mess up the message. It looks awkward, and cluttered. When you right an email, sometimes
leaving

out the extra words is as important as the words you choose to leave in. We often add adjective, and
adverbs, and

filler words which are not necessary. Let me say that again,
at this time with more words. Very often when we write, we put lots of

extra words, like adjectives and adverbs, which when you really think about it,

are very much unnecessary. Both sentences have the same message, but

the first had less than half the words. This is how you make a message brief and

clear. When you're writing, act like you're talking to someone

you want to become friends with. In the start of a relationship we're

very careful about what we say. Afraid of doing something wrong,

we're more cautious with our words. That's said,

think of words as having value. Look at economics,

when there's a high supply of a product, the price is very low. Things that are rare, like gold and

platinum, they're expensive. Think of words in your

email in the same way. Along the theme of the first lesson,

here's a do and a don't. Don't use the passive voice. Do focus on precision. Not passive, rather
precise. Let's look at the next example. Powerful emails are written by people,

or people write powerful emails. Which one sounds more precise? The second one is the active
voice,

and is always clearer. Let's examine this more closely. In English, there are two ways to express

many thoughts, the active and the passive. Here's the difference. When the verb is active,

the subject performs the action. When the verb is passive,

the subject receives the action. Here are some examples. Which one is the active voice? The first one
is active. Which is the active here? Again, the first one. That's why it's more clear. Now, let's focus on
clarity. Your goal here is to be clear. When you write,

make sure you're keeping things in order. When announcing a meeting or an event, for instance, you
will begin

with the name of the event. This will be followed by when, and

for how long the event will last. Finally, exactly where is this meeting? This can even be included

in the name of the event. The key here is to be precise with

the most important information. After you write the email,

sit back and look at it carefully. Imagine that you're

getting the same email, will it give you all

the needed information? Is it easy to understand? Finally, some words to avoid, must,

should, demand, require, necessity. These are all strong words, and may

seem harsh, or even rude to your reader. Go back to the idea I used earlier. Are these words you use
when you're first

meeting someone you want as a friend? Are you likely to become friends

with someone who starts to use these words towards you? My advice is use words that are neutral,

and not forceful. Let's look at a few examples to see which

ones are clear, and easy to understand. In these two examples,

look at the first one. The paragraphs are short, and

the entire email is brief. In the second one, look how crowded

with text, and overwhelming it is. I get emails like this all the time,

and I rarely read them. If I want to read a book, I'll buy one,

or download something to read. So to recap, we looked at how it's better

to be brief, and be your own editor. Take a short break after writing, and

then come back and really concentrate on words that can be taken out without

losing or changing the meaning. We also need to remember to keep

things in a logical order, so that the information is

clear to your reader. Finally, we looked at words to avoid. We want to be certain to

keep from the demanding, or using forceful words in our emails.

 3. g

Welcome back. In our previous lesson, we looked at

some of the basics of an email and at ideas to keep your emails brief and

clear. We also looked at some of

the words we have to avoid. Now, let's turn to some of

the more common capitalization and punctuation errors in English. So punctuation is the little marks
in

written language, like a period or common. It's like road signs. If drivers ignore the road signs,

then there would be worse traffic and many accidents. Just like road signs in any country,

punctuation rules and symbols may be different. So, it's important to understand

the rules when your writing in English. As for punctuation, I want to focus on

six errors that are most common and easy to see quickly. These six are the apostrophe,

the exclamation point, commas, the dreaded semicolon, quotation marks. And finally, emoticons or
text symbols. Before we go into the details of each of

these, let's quickly test your knowledge. Good job. Now, let's get into

the details of punctuation. >> First, the apostrophe. It is used for possession,

like Suzi's laptop or Gerry's address. If you use it in a contraction

like can't or wouldn't, you should not put it in an email. Second, the exclamation point is one of

the most overused symbols in punctuation. Frankly, it should almost never

be used in professional emails. It should never be used more than once. My nephews use these in

messages on Facebook, but I almost never use them at work. Third, commas. The best rule for

these is to read your email aloud. For example, hey Suzi For

our meeting later today, I will bring all of the supplies. If you have time, could you pick up

the coffee and snacks on your way? Thanks, Gerry. If you pause,

that is where a comma should go. Also use commas with FANBOYS,

for, and, nor, but, or yet, and so, when you use these

words to connect two sentences. Next, a list is where

you would need commas. Look at how I wrote all of the FANBOYS. I had to put a comma in between
all
of them, because they are a series or a list of things. You also use commas to set

off all geographical names, like Moscow, Russia or Paris, France. Or for items in dates,

except the month and day, like October 10, 2011 and for titles in names such as

Philip Hollingsworth, MD. This is just basic

information about commas, but you can find more information all

over the internet on this topic. One of my favorite sites

is The Owl at Purdue, where you can find information on pretty

much anything related to grammar and information is geared

toward an ESL audience. Fourth, this is another thing I

tell my students all the time. The semicolon is used wrong

more than it's used correctly. I avoid it, seriously. Even if I'm slightly unsure, I find

a different way to write my thought. But if you must use one, this is one

of the main rules from the Owl website. Use a semicolon to join parts of a series when some items in
the series

already include commas. Fifth, quotation marks. These are not to be used for

emphasis, like in this example. I would really like to meet you. They're only supposed to be used
when

you're telling your reader exactly what someone said. Take a look at this example. He said, I would
really like to meet you. The punctuation for

using them is really tricky. It should be a very rare instance

when you should use these, as well. Again, if you absolutely must use them, you should consult the
online

writing lab at Purdue. Finally, do not use emoticons

like you do in a text message. If you knew your reader

well enough to send a text, you would not be sending an email. Do not mix up the writing styles.
Here's another example of how not

to use the semicolon in an email. There's one punctuation

item I didn't mention, because I thought it might be too easy for

you, it's the period. Don't forget to add it at the end of

every sentence, unless it's a question. So we've now looked at how and

when to use the apostrophe, not over using the exclamation point and

where to place commas. We've also learned about that semicolon,

how to use quotation marks properly. And finally, not using emoticons or

text message type stuff in our emails.