How to Write Professional Emails in English (Greetings, Introducing, Following up, Requesting, and Ending)

Hey, welcome to this lesson on writing a business or professional email in English. Now, this is useful for those of you who are just starting a corporate job, or if you are looking to work in an English environment where emails are constant. So, I use my email every day. I can tell you 100% that I have used all of these at one point or another in my emailing career, we'll say. So, I've sent thousands of emails, and I've used all of these. So, these are phrases that you can use in internal emails between yourself and your colleagues, or between yourself and someone who works with your company. So, maybe you know someone who is selling technology to your company, like printers or computers; maybe there's someone who supplies paper for your company and you have to interact with them, so you can use these phrases and expressions with them.

Start with greetings

So, first we'll start with the greeting. We have: "Hello", "Hi", "Hey, Steve". Steve - these are all for Steve. So, you notice... If you're wondering: "Why didn't you put 'Dear'? Why didn't you put 'To whom it may concern'?" You could still use those. I guess it depends on your own personal comfort with formality. Having worked, like in Canada and exchanging emails with people in the United States, most people are comfortable with a "Hello" or a "Hi". Only use a "Hey" for someone you know. So, these are in level of formality. Of these three, "Hello" would be the most formal; "Hi" would be very neutral; and "Hey" is a very familiar, very informal, so only use this with people you know well or that you have a good professional relationship with. 

Introducing a Topic or Informing

 One thing you might do in an email is to introduce a new topic or to inform someone of something; maybe not just one person, maybe a group of people, maybe a whole department. So, for example: "This is to inform you that..." Very general. So, maybe someone has received a promotion in your company. This is something you might see from your boss; or if you are a boss or a manager, you might send this to your team. "This is to inform you that". Let's say Rosa; you have an employee named Rosa. "This is to inform you that Rosa has been promoted to the position of..." Okay? So you're giving information to your team. This one: "Just to let you know"... Now, this is very informal. So, only send this to people you know well, people within your company, maybe a friend in the company. So: "Just to let you know" is a much more informal, casual way that you can use in an email, instead of: "This is to inform you that..." Okay? So, for example: "Hey. Just to let you know, I'm not here on Friday. Please see me if you need anything from me before Friday." Okay? Also, you're introducing a topic, or informing your company, or someone of something, so: "Hey, Steve. Good news!", "Hey, Steve. Bad news.", "Hey, Steve. I've got good news.", "I've got bad news." Now, you notice, here, I used an exclamation after "Good news", it's a good idea to make it seem exciting, so: "Good news! You know, I just got promoted."  Or: "Good news! I'm getting a raise." Okay? Something like this. "Bad news. We're not getting pizza for free today.", "Bad news. I can't make lunch, sorry." Okay? "I can't make lunch." It doesn't mean you're creating lunch, you're making lunch; it means: "I can't go to lunch with you." Okay? So, you have: "This is to inform you that...", "Just to let you know...", "Good news!", "Bad news.", "I've got good news.", "I've got bad news." 

Following up on a previous discussion/email

This is if you are following up on a previous discussion or a previous email. Now, "following up" means you had a conversation about a topic before, maybe in person, maybe in email, maybe by carrier pigeon and you want to follow up on that email. A carrier pigeon is a bird who brings a letter. So, you can say: "Hey, Steve. As we discussed,..." or "As discussed,..." You can obviously add to this: "As discussed yesterday,...", "As discussed at the meeting,...", "As discussed this morning, please remove your shoes when you enter my office"? It's a strange thing, maybe. I don't know, it depends where you are in the world. Instead of saying: "As discussed,..." you can also say: "To follow up on our meeting,...", "To follow up on our discussion,..." This is the same thing. "As we discussed,..." or "To follow up,...", "To give an update on the information we discussed,..." You can say: "please come to work on time".  Or: "don't leave your lunch in the fridge for five days." Other people use the fridge, Steve. So, next: "Regarding", or "In regards to..." Now, you can use either one of these. So, it just depends how you feel in the moment. "Regarding the quality of your deodorant, please change it soon; everyone can notice. Everyone notices." So: "in regards to", maybe Steve wears strong cologne or strong deodorant and it smells very strong you're just having fun with Steve in an email. Okay. "As far as _______ goes,..." So, this is similar to saying: "Regarding/In regards to", but you put the topic here. So, if you are sending an email about your company budget: "As far as the budget goes, please be careful with your spending." "As far as this weekend's tour goes, it's going to begin at 11 o'clock."  Same here: "On the topic of _______", and you follow up. 

Asking and requesting

If you want to ask for something or request something there are many options. So: "I'd like to know if/when/how/who",  Any question you can think of. "I'd like to know when the meeting ends.", "I'd like to know if I should bring anything."  Instead of saying: "I'd like to know", you can also just say: "Hey. Could you let me know if/when/how", etc. Maybe you're collecting money because it's Rosa's birthday, in the department, and you could say: "Hey. Could you let me know how much money I should contribute?" for Rosa's present or for Rosa's gift card, or whatever. A little more serious: "Could you confirm", "Could you, like, 100% let me know (confirm) if/when/how", etc. So, this is probably a more serious topic; although you could use it to be funny, because it's a more formal expression.  "Could you confirm how much money I should give or how much money I should contribute?", "Could you confirm if we're getting paid today?" just I want to make sure we're getting paid. "Do you know if/when/how", etc.   "Do you know when...? When the money will be in my account?" "Do you know if the printer needs more ink?" "Do you have any details/any update on a topic?" So, if you're ordering promotional material for your company from another company, and you've been waiting for a long time, maybe one week, two weeks, which is a long time in most businesses, so: "Hey. Do you have any update on the promotional material? Do you have any details or any new details on the promotional material?" And another way to say this... "Hey. Could you give me an update? Could you give me a quote or an estimate?" So, a "quote" is if you are in charge of dealing with some of the upper-end parts in your company where you're dealing with other companies, and you want to know: "Hey. How much money does it cost for you to print this promotional material for us?" Or: "How much money does it cost for five new computers? Could you give me a quote?" Usually a PDF or maybe some companies send a physical paper with the breakdown of everything. "Could you let me know how much it costs?" "Could you give me an estimate?" Okay? This means an idea of how much money things are going to cost. 

Saying thanks 

You can write: "Hey. Thanks for getting back to me." So, you sent an email, they sent an email back and they answered a question for you, and you want to send another email... This is, like, the third email in the chain, so you would say: "Hey. Thanks for getting back to me." This means: "Thanks for writing back. Thanks for answering my question." And then you can use one of the other phrases: "Regarding this question,...""Thanks for the info". "Thanks for the information", if you want to be more formal. Again, if you are in a company where you know the people well: "Thanks for the info" is pretty casual, pretty informal; only really use it with people you know well. "...the information", if it's, like, the owner of the company  "...the information" is better. "Thanks for the heads up." So, this is a little more informal as well. So, "Thanks for the heads up" is usually: Thanks for the warning, thanks for the update. So, for example, if someone sends you an email and they say: "Hey. There's going to be a new position opening next week. Why don't you, update your resume and get ready? Because I think you would be good for this job." So, you could say: "Oh, there's going to be a new position opening in the company. Thanks for the heads up."  "Thanks for the warning", so I know before other people. So, think of "heads up", oh, you can... You can see the information that's in the future.  "Thanks for the update.", "Thanks for the email." Very general. "Hey. Thanks for following up on..." or "Thanks for following up with..." Thanks for, basically, keeping up to date or getting new information from this person or on this topic. So: "Hey. Thanks for following up with the accounting department.", "Thanks for following up on our contract."  "...our contract discussion", something like that. "Thanks for your help.", "Thanks for your help with" something. "Hey. Thanks for looking into this, into that." If you look into something, it means you research it, you take a deeper look. So, if a colleague asks you to look into something, they're asking you to get the details of a situation or get the details of something. And if they look into something and they send you the information, say: "Hey. I got the information. The cost of this is $224." It's like: "Oh, $224. Thanks for looking into this. This cost changes everything." So, many ways to say thanks; many things to be thankful for. 

Ending

And finally, closing your email or the ending, you can say: "All right. I'll get back to you as soon as I can." So, this is if someone has asked you for something, has made a request, and you send them some information, you respond, and you can just end with: "Okay. I'll get back to you." Or, if you want to be extra polite and say: "Hey. I'm going to do this": "I'll get back to you as soon as I can." This is very similar to: "I'll let you know as soon as I can."  So, this one,  very common: "I will let you know. When I know"-"I'll let you know". "I'll keep you posted." This means: If I have new information, I will send the information to you. "I will give you an update when I know something." You've asked a question and you want a response, so you end it with: "Please let me know" or just: "Let me know". Add a "please" if you want to be extra polite. "Please keep me posted". "I'll keep you posted.", "Keep me posted." means keep me updated. If there's any new information, tell me. Send me an email if there's any new information on the topic we have discussed. And there's a lot of talk about: How should you end your email? What's too formal? What's not formal enough? Do people still use "Sincerely"? I really only use "Sincerely" on, like, government documents, things that are official from the bank. If you have a complaint letter to a landlord where you're renting, your apartment: "Sincerely" works for those official situations. In most internal company emails, I usually end mine with: "Thanks". You could say: "Regards", you could say: "All the best". So: "Thanks" works for internal, "Thanks" works for somebody you're working with outside the company. "Sincerely" I would just keep it to more official situations where you're dealing with government, or banks, or bigger companies.

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— Saturday, April 9, 2022 — Add Comment — expression