Email usage is on the rise, so says Adobe in its latest survey. It¡¯s only natural considering how many work emails most people have to respond to in a day. Unfortunately, that also means people tend to use the same nails-on-chalkboard phrases over and over.
Adobe took a look at a bunch of innocent phrases that seem to irritate recipients the most when in an email. It¡¯s a pretty good bet you actually have an email with one of these strings in your inbox right now.
It seems people hate the phrase, ¡°Not sure if you saw my last email¡± the most, with 25 percent of respondents saying they despised seeing it in an email. Probably because it walks the line between passive aggressive and straight up calling you stupid. ¡°Per my last email¡± took second place with 13 percent of people loathing it, while ¡°Per our conversation¡± and ¡°Any update on this?¡± both tied for third at 11 percent.
According to Adobe, the reaction to these findings is that perhaps corporate employees just need more communication etiquette training in order to get their point across without being redundant and confrontational.
In addition, Adobe also looked at what email fouls make people unsubscribe from brands, but the learnings translate to everyday mails as well. For instance, 45 percent of respondents hate it when you send emails far too often, and and 33 percent hate it when you send emails that have nothing to do with them. Meanwhile, 17 percent hate it when you misspell their name, despite it likely being in the address you¡¯re sending the email too.
You can read the full report here.