Your future is in your hands, ahem fingers… Literally!

If you want to reach your professional goals, you need to work on your English writing skills. Period.

Even if you are a business development executive or marketer, it’s not only about what you say face to face or in meetings.

You may need to send an offer via email, clarify some details over messages on your phone or even promote your personal and professional brand on social media.

Do you still believe investing in your writing skills is a waste of time? It’s one of the best decisions you’ve ever made. Trust me.

Imagine this (based on an actual client story): you are a top-notch professional in your company, and your ideas and management skills are deeply appreciated.

You’ve done your best to nail that presentation, and you are so close to closing a deal with the client or partner.

Why let your mistakes over an email or instant messaging app ruin your work?

Or people looking for you on social get a very bad first impression from what you write on your posts?

Look, mistakes are OK, part of the learning process.

No need to beat yourself up. What you need is to go about it mindfully.

To make friends with imperfections and mistakes, set realistic goals, improve how you write in English, iterate and nail it!

During my year-long experience with professionals who struggle with their business English writing skills, I’ve found that the most critical skills concern these three areas below:

1. emails
2. instant messaging
3. social media (especially LinkedIn)
   

If you want to make sure that your writing in English at work contributes to your professional and personal goals in a positive way, you need to focus on improving these skills first. 

Why business email is still important

Despite the dominance of instant messaging (e.g. WhatsApp), email is here to stay. And you, as a highly-skilled professional, need to know how to write compelling emails in English.

On point & to the point. 

I know it’s challenging if English is not your native language. But improving your writing skills can get you far.

You certainly don’t want to give your boss, clients or stakeholders a wrong (bad) impression by sending an email full of mistakes, complicated meanings or inappropriate words and phrases, right? 

Let me share some tips with you. They are the Top-7 ones, based on my year-long experience coaching professionals like you.  

7 things to pay attention to when writing a business email

Whether it is a formal or informal email (to a colleague you know well & interact with regularly), follow these tips & make your email count!

✔️ Write a short but descriptive subject line. It’s amazing how most people forget to write subject lines at all!

✔️ Greet the other person & state why you are writing. Set the tone and boundaries!

✔️ Keep it short & simple. Start each sentence with a capital letter. Be sure to put periods or other appropriate punctuation at the end of each sentence.

✔️ Put spaces between paragraphs. The recipient will thank you for making your email easy to read.

✔️ Don’t use fancy words. Also, use as much jargon as necessary.

✔️ End with a clear call to action (or next steps), if you want your email to nudge the recipient to take any action

✔️ Sign off with an appropriate closing. Don’t get too creative with that! A simple “Cheers” for an informal email or “Best regards” for a formal one suffice.

EXTRA TIP: especially for important emails, proofread them carefully & use free tools like Grammarly or Readable.com to improve them even more.

5 things to avoid when writing in English on Messenger or Whatsapp

More and more professionals like you use instant messaging apps to talk with colleagues, clients (or prospective ones), partners or their boss.

You certainly don’t want to ruin your good impression or relationship with them in an instant by typing that wrong word.

Or messing up your English as you write.

Listen! Messaging apps have made it very communication very easy and less disruptive than phone calls, right?

But you need to know how to use them for work (to avoid uncomfortable hiccups).

In the same way, you need to be extra cautious when writing in English, a language other than your native one. Writing is a true skill.

Working on & improving your English writing skills is a necessity nowadays. I’ve heard stories from clients that made me want to laugh (or cry).

Mistypings, mistakes, misunderstandings are unfortunately all on the menu on apps like Messenger, Skype or Whatsapp.

Keep the following 5 tips when you communicate on an instant messaging app next time:

⚠️ Don’t use many words to say something when you can say it with fewer words. Less is more. Again!

⚠️ Don’t type fast & hit that SEND button. Take breaths, think about what you want to reply & do it only when you are sure about it.

⚠️ Don’t translate from your native tongue to English. Meanings get messed up & this might cause confusion or even frustration.

⚠️ Don’t get too personal. Use emojis but don’t overdo it. Keep a balance & pay attention not to send any too intimate or inappropriate ones like

⚠️ Don’t get involved in lengthy chats. It’s 100% sure that it won’t end well. Either you or the other side will become tired / bored / frustrated, OR there will be misunderstandings. If the chat goes on endlessly, suggest talking briefly on a call or arrange for a short meeting soon and take it from there.

4 things to avoid when posting in English on social media

Q: “Why do the French have only one egg for breakfast?”
A: “Because one egg is an OEUF” (which sort of sounds like “enough”) 😅

Things like that appear quite often on your social media feeds, right?

Is that funny? Probably yes. Would your French colleagues misunderstand it? It’s likely.

Will everyone understand it? To be honest, I had to read it a few times to get it.

Be extra cautious when posting in a language other than your native one (like English) on your social media.

Don’t get me wrong! I ENCOURAGE you to do so. It can be a very handy daily practice routine to keep you sharp.

My point is that you need to be careful & empathetic with what you post in English. 

I’ve heard quite a few embarrassing stories from professionals who were my clients. It’s good to practise your English (yes, you can do it!) BUT you also need to be on the safe side, so you can enjoy it while avoiding pitfalls.

Here are the 4 things you should do to nail your social media posts in English:

✔️ 𝗹𝗼𝗰𝗮𝗹𝗶𝘀𝗲, don’t translate. Sayings or common quotes in your native language may sound weird or intimidating in English. If you want to mention one, describe it in words rather than putting it as is in the original language.

✔️ don’t rely on 𝗮𝘂𝘁𝗼𝗺𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗰 𝘁𝗿𝗮𝗻𝘀𝗹𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻. Although some social media translation tools are good or getting better with time, depending on them is risky. Your colleagues, boss or clients may not understand what you say & judge you for poor English (not that they should).

✔️ don’t 𝗻𝗲𝗼𝗹𝗼𝗴𝗶𝘇𝗲. I mean, don’t make up new words or use words only a few use, to sound fancy. If you coin new terms or words, double-check they sound OK in English & don’t have any unintended meanings in other languages.

✔️ last but not least, don’t use 𝗵𝘆𝗯𝗿𝗶𝗱 𝗹𝗮𝗻𝗴𝘂𝗮𝗴𝗲 𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗯𝗶𝗻𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝘀, like Franglais or Spanglish or use them wisely. Done wrong, they may fall flat, like that Franglais joke I put at the beginning of the post.

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Here at ProEnglish, this is my end goal. To empower non-native, highly-skilled professionals like you to claim what you deserve by breaking down the language blockage in a safe, kind and trustful environment.

I am Vera Daskalaki, your mindful English coach. You, being here and reading this, really means a lot to me. Let me know if anything above hits a nerve, and feel free to send me any questions.

If you want to talk about your goals and struggles in English and create a customised plan, just like I’ve done for dozens of professionals in the past, book a free Clarity Call by clicking below.

BOOK YOUR FREE CLARITY CALL

It’s a free 30-min call. No commitment, no obligation. We will talk about your challenges and needs for business English and lay out a path to achieve your goals. 

No catch. Let’s talk and take it from there.