So, after publishing my post on Mexican food and sending a link to Facebook, I discovered a grammatical error. I had a question mark where there should have been a period. Not a huge deal, and I fixed it, but irritating nonetheless that I didn’t catch it before I hit Publish.
It reminded me of an experience I had with business email communication several years ago. I think some of this may be stuff I’ve blogged about before, but even so, I think it’s worth bringing up again, because I know quite a few corporate managers read my blog.
From 2004-2006 I had a job building rebate websites for large corporations. My sites did rebates on everything from cars to consumer electronics to major appliances. I didn’t do any rebates for tube tops, but I did do a site for a well-known brand of jeans. In creating these sites, I had to work with corporate marketing managers. Some of them had the worst communication skills I had ever seen. There was one in particular who would send me emails like this.
I have a question about the site? I tested it a few minutes ago? I indicated that I bought two refrigerators and a disposal? It said my rebate was 230? I think it should be 210? Can you explain?
Now, this guy was a marketing manager. As such, he surely had a college degree. Since he went to college, he surely had to write papers. Since he had to write papers, he surely must have learned at some point that only questions end with a question mark. I guess he only thought periods were necessary for writing college papers though. In business communication, the more question marks, the better! Because if he only used one (which would be proper in the email above), I might not get it that he has a question.
I wish I’d kept this guy’s email address. That way, when I win the lottery I could contact him and tell him how horrible his communication skills are. Until then, though, I guess I have to live by “don’t burn your bridges.” On the days when I was working on his projects, I dreaded getting out of bed in the morning. Why would you want to do things that make people dread working with you?
That wasn’t the worst email I got while at that job, though. One day I logged in and found this gem, not from a marketing manager but from a company president:
ok ok u say u are ready for next phase ok lets talk tomorow 1030 I call
Interpretation: “You are not important enough for me to bother with proper capitalization, punctuation, spelling, and grammar.” I would NEVER write an email like this to the garbage man who empties our dumpster at work, much less to an IT professional with a college degree who is building a site that will hopefully make me a lot of money. It just astonishes me that anyone would think this is acceptable for a business communication, much less a company president.
The excuse that sometimes gets floated is, “Well, normally my secretary types my emails for me. When my secretary isn’t here and I have to type my own emails, I don’t have time to proofread them.” Oh really? You don’t have time to treat the people you do business with, with courtesy and respect? You don’t get it that your emails might reflect badly on you and your company? Everything you do is marketing, whether you realize it or not. The email above is BAD marketing. I can’t remember what this guy’s company sold, but I do remember that I was a potential customer for his product. If I were ready to buy, do you think I’d buy his product or a competitor’s, after he sent me that crap? Probably the competitor’s.
You do have to consider the source before you get nitpicky about people’s email communication. In my current job, I often receive email from people in their 70s and older, people who didn’t grow up around computers, and who may be nearly blind and have difficulty typing. Their emails can be as messy as they want, and I will still do my best to treat them the way I would treat my grandmother or grandfather had they emailed.
But corporate presidents, CEOs, chairmen, veeps, directors, managers? You should know better. If your business email communication resembles either of the above, STOP IT. NOW.
Come to think of it, does your personal communication (other than text messages) resemble the above? If so, STOP IT. NOW. Remember, everything you do is marketing.
Those of you reading this who aspire to become corporate presidents, CEOs, chairmen, veeps, directors, managers: Do your emails resemble the above? If so, STOP IT. NOW.
…..
One postscript before I hit the Publish button:
I have a friend who uses the following email signature: “Sent from my iPhone. Please excuse brevity and grammar.” Now that’s really smart. It lets people know he has a valid excuse for not capitalizing words and using “u” instead of “you.” After all, he’s on a mobile device that’s hard to type on, and for all I know he could have 45 seconds to type this email before he has to board a plane. Really good idea to let people know if there’s a reason why your emails aren’t pristine grammar- and punctuation-wise. If that corporate president had just appended “sry 4 email, secrtry on vaca” to the end of his communication, I would have taken it much better.
All right. Rant/public service announcement over. I’ll be at Bardog at noon for brunch with Panda Manda.