You Are Bold When You Bold Your Email

Today, I opened my inbox to find this:

As usual, my email address was not whitelisted (as I ask buyers to do), and the download link email was in their junk/spam box the whole time. I even have a note to check the contact form they used, but I guess they didn’t.

A snarky, demanding tone, right? With the cherry on the top by bolding just two words with a dash of extra question marks.

If you make the extra effort to bold specific text in an email, you are making a point to make a point. However, many underestimate how bolding certain words or sentences can emphasize an otherwise benign statement.

Bolding only specific terms or phrases certainly emphasizes a point. To think otherwise is, well, silly. When you bold, you make that extra effort precisely so the bolded words have more emphasis.

Level of Emphasis?

Then, if you turn that bolded word to red text — Yikes! Bolding plus red definitely emphasizes those words even further. Then add multiple !!! or ??? and you are relaying an aggressive tone.

Here’s the thing. While you obviously want to add emphasis, you cannot control the level of emphasis the recipient perceives. So, plan on the person on the other side to perceive that emphasis X10 your intent.

You need to ensure that this emotional and emphasized tone is what you want to relay before hitting send. To say after the fact that you “didn’t mean it that way” is a cop-out, and no one will believe you anyway.

Own it.

Claiming you didn’t mean it simply reflects that you cannot stand behind your comments. Then, explaining what you meant to say when you composed that email specifically in that manner will compromise your commentary.

Otherwise, why did you put those exact words in bold? Why did you change them to red?

Emotionally charged emails often include bolding certain words or phrases. The sender wants to make sure the other side understands how strongly they feel at that moment in time.

Word of Advice

If you find yourself bolding several portions of an email (or hitting the keyboard with a little more oomph) because you want to make a point, why not wait until the following day to see if you still feel as strongly?

You will probably be glad you did.