I received an email with a subject line about picking up t-shirts and a thank you note to the group for participating in a company event. Can you take a guess what the email was about? If you said “t-shirts and a thank you note,” you’d be wrong. It was about a new training session and process change a team will be rolling out in the coming weeks. The topic is confusing as it doesn’t match the subject, and I have no idea why I’m on this email thread (it was a ‘reply all’ scenario that hit my inbox several times already).

This is a bit of a pet peeve of mine, and when I saw it come through once again, it prompted me to write a post about what you might not want to do.

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Don’t do this (an email example)…

To: Team-Austin Distro

From: Amy H.

Subject: Event T-Shirts & Thank You

———————————————

A quick note to thank everyone for an amazing event! You can pick up your team shirts at the front desk. Looking forward to next year! – Amy To: Team-Austin Distro; Amy H.

From: Todd C.

Subject: Re: Event T-Shirts & Thank You

———————————————

Hi, Amy – Would you please let me know if I had any feedback about the presentation I gave at the event? I was hoping to make any changes before the conference in September. Thanks! – Todd

A few things happened here:

The person replied to the email with a different topic that doesn’t match the subject line. The person ‘replied all’ when the message was meant for the original sender.

Why does it matter? If you ‘reply all’ without considering the audience, you may be sending an email to uninterested parties, and thus unnecessarily filling peoples’ [already overflowing] inboxes.

If you change topics without updating the subject line, it could create confusion on the topic of the email, especially if there is a back-and-forth discussion about the new topic. Remember, the subject line is often the first thing people see after the name of the sender. Someone may overlook important information contained in an email because the subject line was inaccurate.

Do this instead…

Topic Change | If someone sends an email and you want to reply to the email with a different topic, either:

Change the subject line to match the new topic Create a new email reflecting the new subject matter

Audience| If you are ‘replying all’ to an email, ask yourself:

Should the people in the To/Cc lines receive my email or is it relevant to them? Will they find any value in reading my response?

If you are answering ‘no’ to one or both of these questions, you might consider dropping them from the reply.

What should have happened…

To: Team-Austin Distro

From: Amy H.

Subject: Event T-Shirts & Thank You

———————————————

A quick note to thank everyone for an amazing event! You can pick up your team shirts at the front desk. Looking forward to next year! – Amy To: Amy H.

From: Todd C.

Subject: Re: Event Presentation Feedback

———————————————

Hi, Amy – Would you please let me know if I had any feedback about the presentation I gave at the event? I was hoping to make any changes before the conference in September. Thanks! – Todd

Or, you could start a new email with the new topic and subject line.

Compare | Notice the Team-Austin Distro was removed and the subject line updated to reflect the new topic? Try reading the original example and the example with the changes. Does it bother you as much as it bothers me? Maybe it’s just me. 🙂

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Thanks for reading! Follow my blog to get updates on new posts. Until next time… stay cool.

If you haven’t read it already, check out my post How To Write Better Email Subjects.