Broadminded x Kim Arnold: Get what you want everytime you hit send

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We were delighted to be joined by Kim Arnold, author of 'Email Attraction' who taught us how to make every message count

 

Key Takeaways:

 

1. The average white collar workers spends a whopping 52,000 hours emailing - that’s 6 years! Yet 90% of us have never received any guidance or training on writing a good email. 

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2. Write your subject line at the end - after you’ve tackled the main body of the email.

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3. Your subject line is your canapé, or appetiser - your reader needs to feel something to want to read it on; curiosity, excited, a sense of urgency etc. 

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4. The main body of your email must not be an impenetrable wall of words! You should: 

- have a simple, separate first sentence 

- 16 words in a sentence at the maximum 

- 2/3 sentences per paragraph 

- 1.5, or 1.15 line spacing 

- font size 12  

- embrace the white space! 

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5. Draft your email in a small window - so many people open their emails on their phone so test to see if they’ll see a bombardment of text, or digestible information.

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6. A clear call to action (CTA) is key: ideally ask for one thing, failing that use a numbered list. Be direct with a clear next step and provide a timeframe. For example, ‘Please add your comments to section 4 of the report and return to me via email by close of play on Friday’. 

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7.  Emojis can be useful to give clear meaning to some words, but can also appear flippant so be aware of your recipient and subject matter; the same goes for exclamation marks. 

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8. It’s understandable to want to do an email ‘cull’ when your inbox is overwhelmed and they’re over a certain age but don’t delete them. Rather why not mark as ‘read’ and put them in an archive folder? 

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9. If your email has been ignored, don’t just resend it! It didn’t work the first time so why would the same email work a second time? Reread it: was it clear? did it provide a CTA with a timescale? Redraft it before resending it and avoid passive aggressive language such as ‘as per my last unanswered email...’

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10. And finally, no-one needs a generic sign off in their signature - for example ‘Kind Regards’. Do you really want to sign off in the same way to every person you email?