In a world with many languages which are divided into many dialects and sub-dialects, and with so many groups containing their own lingo and abbreviations, it can be hard to figure out how to communicate clearly and make yourself understood. With that in mind, I have compiled a list of tips to help you communicate clearly. These are the ones I consider most important, but I recommend reading RFC 1855: Netiquette Guidelines as it has a bit more than what I've provided below.
- Don't over-abbreviate. When in doubt, spell it out.
- When talking to a stranger for the first time, don't abbreviate at all except to refer to well-known organizations (FBI, CIA, etc.). As you get to know each other, you will get to know each other's familiarity with abbreviations.
- There are a lot of abbreviations out there, some of them with multiple meanings, so it can be difficult for some people to keep track of them all and figure out which one you actually mean.
- Consider the sentence "I'm at Wal-Mart atm." That could mean you are at Wal-Mart at the moment. It could also mean you are standing next to the automatic teller machine ("bank machine") inside the Wal-Mart as some Wal-Marts have one, usually in customer service. Some examples can be more difficult than that.
- Pay attention to your use of homonyms. Homonyms are words with different spellings and meanings but which are pronounced the same.
- It isn't exactly hard to sort out which homonym you meant based on context, but it can take a second or two. For someone who needs to engage in a lot of written/text communications, this can get very annoying very quickly.
- Examples include "to", "two", and "too", or "there", "their", and "they're".
- Pay attention to spelling, grammar, punctuation, and capitalization, as these help provide clarity to your message.
- Most web browsers and e-mail clients have a built-in spell checker. If you see a squiggly line appear underneath a word, or if a word changes color automatically, right-click it to see spelling suggestions.
- On a similar note, avoid using ALL CAPS as this is perceived as the text version of yelling or shouting.
- Using caps for the occaisional word or two is usually okay for emphasis, but you should keep this to a minimum.
- Also avoid run-on sentences. Separate sentences with a period ".", separate sections of the same sentence with a comma ",", and separate parts of a compound sentence with a semi-colon ";".
- Be specific in what you mean. Don't imply meaning. Make your meaning obvious.
- As an extension to this, make sure you explicitly indicate sarcasm, humor, and expressions of emotion. Text does not have non-verbal cues and the subtle meanings that we can infer from them, so these aren't always obvious to people who are reading your messages.
- As another extension to this, don't use "jargon", or language specific to a certain community, activity, hobby, or job, unless you know the person you are speaking to is familiar with the jargon you are using.
- As yet another extension to this, don't assume the person you are speak to knows something. If that person knows about a given topic, he/she will say so -- but do not assume as such until you receive a confirmation of knowledge.
- If a message you receive is ambiguous, ask for clarification; never assume meaning. If someone misinterprets your message, politely provide clarification on what you meant.
- Keep messages short and to the point. People don't want to read more than necessary to get your message.
- Conversely, you should make sure you include all the detail necessary to get your message across. Keeping your message short is important -- but making sure you provide all the information necessary is more important.
- Always use "plain-text" for e-mail, not HTML or "rich-text".
- Most web-mail providers and e-mail clients include an option in the settings to choose between rich-text (or HTML) and plain-text.
- Many e-mail clients disable HTML rendering by default for privacy and security reasons, and many people don't want to enable it for the same reasons. This means many people will be presented with a wall of code when receiving messages with "rich-text formatting" and will thus have difficulty reading your message. This may also result in your message being "transformed" into a wall of code in the auto-quotes when the person replies to you, and many people are too lazy (or may simply forget) to remove this wall of code from the quotes.
- When sending e-mails, include a clear and concise subject.
- Vague subjects, and messages with no subject, are often perceived as unimportant before they are opened, and may be ignored.
- When replying to an e-mail, it is generally a good idea to have your reply below the auto-quotes.
- If the other person needs to reference the quotes, this provides a more natural and easier-to-follow way of reading the quotes without a lot of scrolling back-and-forth, especially on a small screen (e.g. a smart phone screen).
- If the quotes start to get too long, you can remove the oldest quotes when replying, keeping only the last two or three messages in the quotes. You can also truncate the quotes if needed, keeping only the relevant parts.
- If you truncate the quotes, provide a visual indicator that the quotes were truncated. One way to do this is to replace the removed parts with ellipses "...".
- Most web-mail providers and e-mail clients have an option in the settings to place your reply above or below the auto-quotes. This makes it easier for you to do one or the other by default without having to manually rearrange your message.
- If you need a response to a message, be patient with the other person.
- For instant messaging/chat rooms, wait at least 30 minutes before sending a reminder.
- Most chat clients allow people to set a "status" of either "Away" or "Online". If you are not geting a response, check their status, e.g. by hovering the arrow over their name or looking directly underneath their name.
- For "non-instant messaging" (e-mail, private message on social network, etc.), wait at least 24 hours before sending a reminder.
- Some people have religious practices that may prevent them from checking their messages for a day or two at a time. Be patient in these cases.
- Most people don't stare at their screens in a constant state of checking for messages. They have other things they need to attend to in both the digital and real worlds (work, family, emergencies, sleep, holidays, etc.) and may even be in a different time zone from you, so there will likely be a delay between when you send someone a message and when they are able to respond.
