Advanced E-mail Options Photos: © 2010 Photos.com

This lesson will cover: Advanced sending options. Code of conduct when using e-mail. Setting the importance of e-mail. Adding a signature to e-mail. Functional Skills: This presentation covers the following Functional Skills standard: Develop, Present and Communicate Information Level 2 7.1 – create, access, read and respond appropriately to email and other ICT-based communication, including attachments, and adapt style to suit audience. Teacher's notes: The worksheet Sending Emails accompanies this presentation.

Advanced sending options

Netiquette

Setting the importance E-mail has become so popular that many people receive tens, even hundreds of e-mails a day. How can you ensure that important or urgent e-mails are read immediately? One option is to set the message to high importance. Teacher’s notes: You may wish to add that the importance settings can also be changed by clicking the “Options” button in the menu bar of your e-mail. You may also wish to point out that not all e-mail programs are the same, and if you are not using Microsoft Outlook, you may not see the same icons. Hotmail has similar icons to Outlook and Netscape mail allows you to set the priority of a message between high and low. However, Yahoo! Mail has no options for setting importance. One way to get around this is to write URG or URGENT in the subject line, which will alert the recipient to the message’s importance. You can also write RAL (read at leisure) for low importance e-mails, such as jokes and news stories. Standard e-mails are set to normal importance, but you can make them high importance by clicking this icon: You can also make e-mails low importance by clicking on this icon:

High or low importance

What can/should be included in the signature? Adding a signature An electronic signature can be added to personalize e-mails or make them look more professional. Adding a signature means that contact details do not have to be typed in every time an e-mail is sent. This saves time and reduces the likelihood of mistakes being included in the details. Teacher’s notes: The signature can contain any content the sender wants, but it is important that it is appropriate for the recipient. Examples of what the signature could contain include: a scanned version of the handwritten signature (as seen in the screen shot) name job title telephone number fax number e-mail address home/company/school address some signatures also contain a statement or quotation to give the e-mail a more personal or professional feel. Microsoft product screen shots reprinted with permission from Microsoft Corporation. What can/should be included in the signature?

Creating a signature in Outlook Microsoft product screen shots reprinted with permission from Microsoft Corporation.

Summary quiz