BE 377: How to Get a Genuine Response to Your Email in 2025
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This is the Business English Podcast, Episode 377, How to Get a Genuine Response to Your Email in 2025.

Welcome to the Business English podcast from All Ears English. Get the English skills you need to achieve your dreams in global business. For a presentation, a meeting, or your office party, this is Real Business English with your favorite American hosts, Lindsay and Aubrey, coming to you from Arizona and Colorado, USA. Welcome to the Business English podcast from All Ears English.

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Hey, Aubrey, how are you today? I'm great, Lindsay. How are you? Good. But Aubrey, I'm wondering about something. There's always so much to learn from people that are parents, right? Because there's so much knowledge there. When you try to get your kids to do something like clean up their clothes on the floor, wash dishes, what techniques do you use to get them to listen to you and do the thing and follow up?

What do you like to do? How can you do it? Well, this is really interesting because I've found that it's so different for each of my children. What worked for my eldest daughter does not work for the youngest. So I have to use different strategies depending on the especially my youngest son has ADHD. And we've realized that unless we like touch his shoulder and make eye contact while we're asking,

He is not going to hear it. He's not going to do it. It's not that he's being disobedient. He's just thinking about something else, focusing on something else. So we have to find out what works for each child. Yeah, well, that makes perfect sense. And I feel like there's a lot of insight that you've learned there about your kids that we could carry into the business world. Whether it's responding to our colleagues or responding to suppliers, clients, we need to individualize things. We need to keep it simple, have a personalized response to them.

Don't we? Absolutely. This comes up a lot with emails where I feel like I send a very different email depending on not only what it's about, but who I'm emailing, right? The tone is going to be really different. The vocabulary is going to be different. We personalize all the time at work.

100%. So this is what we're getting into today. How do we send an email that's going to number one, get read, number two, get a genuine response, meaning a human being hears what you've written, sees what you've written, thinks about it and responds. Not a canned response, not an auto responder.

Right. I'm excited to get into this challenging episode today. So guys, go ahead and hit the follow button now. But we do have a survey to let our listeners know about results on. Yes, right. I hope you are filling out these polls in Spotify. They're so fun. We're going to announce the results for one. This was from episode 360 here on the Business English podcast, Busy or Bored? How to Talk About Workload in English.

And we asked, do you have a busy season at work? I know that some people it's steady all year long, but some people really have a spike, a busy season. And the results were interesting, yeah? Yeah, very interesting. So we 64% of you said, yes, you do have a busy season. I mean, maybe that's our accountants in the audience. Maybe there are engineering fields that are more busy at certain times. Yeah, teachers, definitely every teacher has a busier season. So for a lot of professions, that makes sense.

And then 35% was a no. Interesting. Interesting. Steady, fast and steady or slow and steady all year long. Listen in today because we're going to announce our next poll. Gives you a chance to let your voice be heard on the show. Yeah.

Okay, let's dive into our question from Claire YN from Taiwan, who, by the way, had left a five-star review. So thank you to Claire. Yeah, this is great. So Aubrey, would you go ahead and read the question? Absolutely. I am a purchasing agent who frequently imports products from the United States and other countries to sell in Taiwan, communicating primarily in English.

I have noticed that when I send emails addressing issues such as inadequate packaging leading to damaged goods, heavy items placed on top of lighter ones causing deformation, or missing items with repeated explanations of computer errors, the responses I receive are often formulaic and unhelpful, lacking genuine improvement.

Could you please advise me on how to craft my emails more persuasively to elicit sincere responses and achieve real improvements? Thank you very much. Have a nice holiday. What a great question. I can see that this would be a very frustrating issue to deal with. And such a well-worded question too. I love some of the vocabulary. We don't have time to get into the vocabulary in the question, but it is very high level. So way to go, Claire.

First thing we want to say is we want to make a quick disclaimer that we don't work in supply chain manufacturing. We never I never have. I don't know if you have. Me neither. No. Right. Right. So so what we're going to do today is we're going to present some broad tips on how to get someone

to respond to your email, things you can do with your email to get a genuine response and hopefully an improvement. So this is not specific to supply chain manufacturing, okay? - Yeah, but we have both been in those situations where either we're having to complain about something, write a letter of complaint,

or we need something to change, something to be improved. This is applicable in every field of the business world that you are going to need to provide negative feedback with the goal of seeing a change, a fix, an improvement. Exactly. And these days it's just hard with emailing. People are so busy. I mean, I log in on Monday mornings, I have 100 emails in my inbox.

We have to catch the person. I mean, and also very transparently, I'll admit that sometimes here at All Ears English, when we have a student refund one of our courses, I will send a personalized email and say, "Hey, what's up? Why did you decide to refund your course? Can you let us know how we could improve our courses?" So that's the analogy that I kind of used here in my head as we wrote this episode plan. - Yeah, we're requesting that feedback, right? We want to know how we can improve and grow and change.

And it's the same idea because Claire is looking to get a response so that they can work with that supplier to do a better job with packaging, solve the problem and therefore both sides will succeed and make more sales. Right? So Aubrey, let's get into it. We have four tips to get a genuine email response. All right. Or any response at all, let's say. Yeah. Right. Because the easier thing is for someone to give a canned response.

especially if they're getting a lot of emails like this, you kind of can't blame them for doing that. So what can you include in your email to get that more genuine response? Yeah. So our first tip for today is to use the person's name. Now it might be tempting to send kind of a bulk email that you pre-create as a template.

But that means you can't address this with their name. And people, it's still one of the most powerful things to hear your own name. Don't you think, Aubrey? Absolutely, right? It feels like someone is reaching out to you. So even if it is an email list, you know, you can use a code in a mass email because it is... I'm probably not going to read an email that doesn't start with my own name, especially if it's from someone I don't recognize their name. And then when it comes to, you know, do we use first name? Do we use last name? I think in American business...

First name is frequently used, but it really depends on your industry, how well you know the person. Are you on a first name basis with the person or not? I know in the podcasting industry, I'm always emailing with, I don't know, different networks and deals and things. And there's a lot of first naming going on there, like hi, Sarah, for example. But it might be different in this industry.

shipping industry right so if you don't have their first name you know mr or mrs with their last name is acceptable i would avoid like dear sir slash ma'am we see this a lot but it's way too formal and very impersonal we see this a lot kind of internationally and it's a really it's

Really avoid it. Especially if you're emailing because Claire is talking about emailing someone within the US, probably an American person. So that's really a turnoff when I see something like an email starting, "Dear sir, dear ma'am."

I just, I hate it. If you don't have their name, you can probably find it out, right? If you reach out a little bit, take a little bit of time, LinkedIn, like you can probably at least find out their last name. Yeah, take a little bit of extra effort to get their name, at least their first or their last name. What would be the second tip, Aubrey?

Yeah, so this is to make the grammar a little more casual and simple. Often the grammar chunks we use, the structures we're using are too formal. Like, for example, would you please inform me about the packaging workflow? This, you're creating distance, you're creating a wall and inviting a more canned response.

Yeah, I love how you said that you're creating a wall, you're causing a bit of a glazing over. When you do use this very formal grammar, like would you please inform me about x instead? What if we said, I'm wondering what the packaging workflow is?

Right? Yes. That's much more informal. It's putting you at the same level where they're going to feel maybe more sympathy for the problem you're dealing with. Yeah, exactly. And I do believe there's a way we can, if we're really good at this, we can add these informal kind of strategic ways of phrasing things, but still write a formal, respectful email. There is a way to do it.

- Absolutely, right? Instead of can you provide additional details, which is very formal, you could say, can you explain more? - Yeah, it just allows the person to say, oh my gosh, yeah, this person actually crafted this email themselves.

And it feels personal, so I wanna respond. I wanna tell you as the supplier in the US, maybe now I do wanna let you know, Claire, what's going on and why things are being packaged the way they are and how we might be able to improve it. - Exactly, right? You have to realize if there is no relationship, unfortunately, a lot of people are not going to feel like they owe you much of an explanation, especially knowing how busy people are. You have to sort of create that relationship

create this, you know, bond between you to make them want to help you. Exactly. That's why in business English, we focus so much on building relationships and business. It's not just with your colleagues, it's with your suppliers, with the people you buy from with your manager, this is huge, huge, right? That's like your foundation, right, Aubrey?

Exactly. So our third tip is to use we, right? Focus on teaming up with this supplier. You are on the same team. You have the same goal here, right? If your customers like the product, you will order more from them. So if you're using framing this in a way that it's our problem, not just your problem, then you might get a better response. Exactly. So for example, what can we do to improve the packaging so that we both see increased sales this year?

All right, so get on the same team. So smart. Yeah, or you could say, I'd love to send you more business in 2025. Can we work together to resolve some packaging issues so that we can get you more orders? So here you're making it their problem as well, right? But not just their problem, together you're on the same team. Exactly, so good.

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All right, Aubrey, we are back with tip number four. All right. So tip number four is to end the email with a question or a call to action. This is something I consider when I want to make sure I get a response because the fact is people are just so busy. If you put the question in the middle of your email, first of all, your email should not be more than three or four sentences, right? Right.

But even if you put it in the middle of the three to four sentences, they may not know what you're at. It has to be very clear, especially in business, what they should do next.

Okay. Yeah, right or imagine if all you do is describe the problem and then there's no question There's no call to action They might read it and just kind of save it for later because they don't feel that drive to respond immediately Save it for later dangerous because then you get into the inbox going down down down down down It could be gone forever. You need a response right away So for example ending my email with something like can you share some information about how the product gets made and

Right? Or would you mind sharing some information about the manufacturing process? Or any information you can share about how this gets assembled will be greatly appreciated. And this is respectful. It's polite, but it's your last sentence. So it's the next thing they're going to do. Okay? Exactly. Right. Or maybe do you have any suggestions for how we could improve the way we put together the boxes? I love this. We, you're really on the team. Like we're putting together the boxes. It's really good. Exactly.

I love it. So good. So those are the four tips. Aubrey, any thoughts on the four tips today? Any overarching themes coming up for you? I really love all of these. I know that if I were to get an email with this issue, if these four things were used, I would be much more likely to prioritize it, to feel like I'm on your team and to give you a genuine quick response and try to fix the problem. I love it. So before we wrap up with our takeaway, we do have a poll for today, Aubrey.

And we mentioned earlier in the episode, it's important to use the person's name. So what's our poll? Yeah, we want to know, are you good at remembering people's names? I am not. I have never been good at this. I try to use strategies. So I'm really curious, listeners, if you are good at this. Are you good at this, Lindsay? I'm not very good at this, Aubrey. I think the problem is in the moment when I meet someone, I'm really focused on eye contact,

giving off a good impression. So I don't always hear the name the first time. It's so bad. It's so bad. Same. So answer our poll in Spotify. We want to know if you have the same problem. Maybe send us, leave a comment on YouTube with some tips for us to remember names better.

Yeah, it's so good. So I mean, that's the takeaway. These are the four steps I would like to challenge Claire or anyone else that is struggling with how to get a response to your email, right? You need these answers to improve your business or your success at work. Try these four tips or just try one of them and it will definitely improve your likelihood of hearing back from the supplier.

All right. Yes, absolutely. You need to personalize it just like I have to personalize with my kids. This is vital at work. For sure. Love it. So good. All right, Aubrey. Thanks for hanging out on Business English. I'll talk to you soon. Awesome. See you next time. All right. Bye. Bye. Bye.

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