The Official Blog of AREA203 Digital

How many of us have sent out an email or a text message only to have it interpreted a little—or worse, completely—differently than we intended? In this age of email, social media, texting and instant messaging, it’s not a matter of if miscommunication will happen, but rather when.

It Happened To Me Last Week

I sent instructions about an upcoming campaign I am working on, but I sent it to the wrong person. The person who received the email had no idea what the message meant. I apologized and then sent my message to the correct recipient. The person didn’t seem to be upset about getting the incorrect email and thanked me for the clarification. Still, I failed to follow one of my own communication rules, wasting my (and another person’s) time. (See if you can guess which rule I broke from the list below.) It was a little embarrassing, too.

When we send a message, we know what we want to say and we think we’re saying it.  So why can our words so easily cause an email war or hurt feelings?

Here are some possibilities:

• The tone of our messages can be misinterpreted.
• We often omit or misuse punctuation.
• We have a tendency to leave out or misspell words.

What Should You Do?

So what should you do when you find out that someone has issues with something you wrote?  First, you need to assess the damage and determine if it affects external vendors and/or business opportunities, or if the offended party is an internal customer or coworker. You need to address the issue and not ignore it. You can write another email, blog or tweet, and explain what you really meant to say.  You may even want to meet face to face with the person to discuss what happened.

Rules to remember:

• Use grammar and spell check with all of your messages.
• Reread what your wrote…and then read it again.
• If possible, ask someone else to read what you’ve written to see how they interpret it.

Don’t Ignore It

Despite our best intentions, chances are we will still be misunderstood from time to time. The worst thing we can do is ignore it. We need to own our mistakes, correct them and, if possible, move on.

Last week, I failed to reread my message before I sent it. Following that simple step would have saved me some time and embarrassment.

→ Brenda Ream, Affiliate Marketing Rep, AREA203 Digital; follow… @pacersbren