Friday, January 4, 2013

Email Etiquette - Improper Spelling Doesn't Send the Right Message

We've all done it: hurried through an email so quickly that we didn't double-check for spelling. However, chances are, if you did have any misspellings, your recipient noticed.

Email -- there was a time when it was reserved for casual conversation. However, these days, email has evolved into a primary means of conversation for, both, business and personal matters.

When using email for professional purposes especially, it is important to always double check your message to ensure you have spelled each word correctly.

A few suggestions to facilitate accurate spelling:

- Turn your email provider's "auto spell check" feature on so whenever you press send, your document will be scanned for spelling errors, highlighting any unrecognizable words.

- If your service does not have the automatic feature described above, make a habit of always running a spell check before you press send.

- Finally, if your email account does not have a spell check feature at all, draft emails in a word processing application that does have a feature that checks spelling, and then copy and paste your text into your outgoing message box.

Also, while spell check is a useful tool, do not rely on it exclusively. Always double-check your emails for words you may have spelled but used incorrectly. Your computer will not catch these (for example: "to" vs. "two" vs. "too" OR "their" vs. "they're" vs. "there").

Double checking for spelling errors may take a little more time, but in the end the task is certainly worth the time. Think about it, while you're trying to convey one message to email recipients, if your emails are always filled will spelling errors, you may be conveying another message -- the wrong message.

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