Greetings and Salutations - PM Etiquette

[Shalot]

I was writing a PM just now and for some reason I was at a loss as to how to end it.

Should I just stop typing when I have said what i needed to and push the send button? At work, I end all my emails with "Thanks" because I am usually requesting (telling) someone to do what they need to do so that the organization can keep operating and a "Thanks" is appropriate. And most of the work emails I get all end in "thanks" so when I was sending off my little private message, I was about to type thanks, realized i wasn't at work and sat there wondering what I should put.

I've seen "cheers" a lot on forums, but that's just not me. I typed bye and then thought that was kind of dumb. I don't PM that much and I don't know why I started obsessing about it. Does anyone else have PM hang-ups? Apparently, I don't PM enough!!

[mtpspur]

I generally do Love Rich (hoping for presents or Logos phone number) or Your friend--If I think I am or hope I am. Probably overthinking it too much but the long suffering one thinks I'm crazy anyway.

[Petrarch's Love]

Here's a list of some closing salutations I often use on PM's, e-mails, and other casual written correspondence. Perhaps this will help you find something you like:

Best,
Warm Best,
All Best,
Best Wishes,
With Warmest Wishes,
Take Care,
Kind Regards,
Cheers,
Thanks,
TTFN, (or also the full "ta ta for now")
Ciao,
Au Revoir,
Cheerie-O,
Toodle-Pip,
See you around,
See you around the forums,
Your pal (or friend, chum, mate, amica, etc.),
Later Alligator,
Thinking of you,
God Bless,

Sometimes, especially if it's a personal message, I close with a phrase such as "My thoughts and/or prayers are with you," or "All my best to you and yours." Seasonally I say stuff like "Happy Holidays."

[kratsayra]

Gosh I know what you mean. I sign almost all of my emails to professors with "thanks" (because I'm usually asking them a question or asking them to do something for me!) and I sign almost all of my emails to students with "best" (because that's what professors always write in emails to me!). If I want to be slightly more sincere or something, I write "all the best"

to friends I don't know that well, I usually write "see you" at the end of emails (even if I won't).

for PM's I am usually confused too.

and to very close friends and family I just put my name at the end of the email with no closing. sometimes when I am posting on forums I have a tendency to write my (real) name at the bottom of a post as though I were writing an email (like to my mom or my boyfriend). And then I'm like - wait - wrong place! and then I delete it. I hope none have slipped through . . .

<my real name here> ;)

[Shalot]

I generally do Love Rich (hoping for presents or Logos phone number) or Your friend--If I think I am or hope I am. Probably overthinking it too much but the long suffering one thinks I'm crazy anyway.

see, I always end letters to close relatives with Love, but that doesn't seem appropriate for a PM here. Love is such a strong word. Of course, it is a common closer, but that word (to me) only goes to my family. I don't even put that in correspondence to friends.

When I did letters as a kid, I did "Your Friend" and a coworker signed a card to me with "Your Friend," but I still don't think "your friend" suits me.

Maybe I should pick something kind of outdated and cheesy like "Peace Out."

hmmmm.

[Riesa]

how bout...
~ Shalot

[papayahed]

Maybe I should pick something kind of outdated and cheesy like "Peace Out."

hmmmm.

How about "Audi 5000"???:lol:

I just looked at some sent PM's and I'll either put my real name (usually that's if they told me they're name or I feel like I want the recipient to know my name) or I'll just stop typing.

[SleepyWitch]

Cheerie-O,
Toodle-Pip,


hahahhahahah :lol: these are hilarious. could you please send me a PM that just says Cheerie-O or Toodle-Pip? :D


Best

Gosh I know what you mean. I sign almost all of my emails to professors with "thanks" (because I'm usually asking them a question or asking them to do something for me!) and I sign almost all of my emails to students with "best" (because that's what professors always write in emails to me!). If I want to be slightly more sincere or something, I write "all the best"

uh? I didn't know you can write "Best" without "Wishes" following it or "All the" before it. is that very common or is it something only absent-minded professors do?

Shalot, I usually go for "take care" or "see ya" in PMs, but as you can see above that's mainly because I didn't know what a wealth of possibilities there is :D

[Niamh]

See ya
La gra
:wave:
catch you later!
Nite nite
slan

to name a few!

[LadyW]

Or you could always go for the classic and oh-so-formal...
"Innabit"

[symphony]

I usually wind up my ones with a "~Symph", or may be (if i'm feeling better,) with a "Love, Symph".

[Koa]

Sleepy, "best" alone is very common, most of the emails I got from professors/people in the Uni office in England ended like that.

Honestly, I never thought about how to end a PM, it takes me much more thought to end a formal email (if they used 'best', I don't want to use it myself and it doesn't seem formal enough to me...). I end PMs as I'd end mails to friends, withy 'bye', or 'take care' and/or my name or screen name. I think. If it's a long, ongoing conversation then I just stop typing when I've said what I had to say, because it's like a dialogue and I don't feel I have to say bye yet.

[Virgil]

I usually just end it with my name, either my on-line name or my real name.

[manolia]

I usually end them with "take care" and my name.

[andave_ya]

I usually go "Cheers, Andave" or Andy, or Andya, or AndyAve....

[Logos]

.... (hoping for presents or Logos phone number) ....

ROFL :D

I usually sign PMs with a 'cheers, /Logos' or 'cheers, /L' or just '/Logos', but it depends on what I'm PMing about. If it's a stern warning and I'm not in a good mood I might just sign /Logos. If it's a warning to someone I like and would rather not have to warn, I often try inject some levity somewhere in the PM, gawd knows I have to do it often around here :p

And now that I've just checked it seems I also sign off a lot with 'Hope this helps, /Logos' or 'Let me know if you still have trouble with {insert site problem here}' :lol:

[Nocturna]

Pm's don't bother me as much... anything friendly is usually ok. (I hope we talk again soon / Cheers! / Love / Simply my screenname.... etc)

What I seriously hate are formal e-mails... especially when I'm writting a professor I get along with or something. I don't want to make it sound too friendly, because it might be disrespectful, but too formal just sounds stupid sometimes :(

[Koa]

What I seriously hate are formal e-mails... especially when I'm writting a professor I get along with or something. I don't want to make it sound too friendly, because it might be disrespectful, but too formal just sounds stupid sometimes :(

I agree...formal e-mails take me ages. And it was very hard in the UK because in Italy we're so much more formal...in the UK people call professors by their first name and say 'hello' to them! :eek: One of my friends - American - would write emails to teachers without even a first line and without ending, just starting abruptly with her question, and ending either with her name or nothing :eek: In Italy doing that is soooo unpolite and some grumpy old professors even go mad if we don't use the most formal greetings, which are so old-fashioned.

[subterranean]

At work I have this automatic setting that every time I compose, reply, or forward an email, the signature always be inserted. I use 'Thanks and Regards'..Don't know whether that's correct according to biz correspondence or not. :) And sometimes I found my self in shalot's situation where I didn't need to thank anyone, so then I'd erase the 'thanks' part. It can be annoying sometimes though..
In informal situation, I like using 'cheers' and sometimes when it's a very happy emails, I tend to use 'big cheers' or 'super cheers' or 'mega cheers' :D

[SleepyWitch]

I agree...formal e-mails take me ages. And it was very hard in the UK because in Italy we're so much more formal...in the UK people call professors by their first name and say 'hello' to them! :eek: One of my friends - American - would write emails to teachers without even a first line and without ending, just starting abruptly with her question, and ending either with her name or nothing :eek: In Italy doing that is soooo unpolite and some grumpy old professors even go mad if we don't use the most formal greetings, which are so old-fashioned.

yeah, I so know what you mean! I didn't have to write too many e-mails to profs in England, but I could never bring myself to call my seminar tutor (who had a PhD) "Tess". I think I once managed to call a famous American Shakespeare prof (Carol Rutter) "Carol, can we use our dictionaries?" but it was sooooooooooo embarrassing :blush: When I had to write an e-mail, I always wrote "Dear professor X" and "thanks so much for your help". I only wrote "Dear Sherry" or whatever after they had signed with their first name once.

[Weisinheimer]

my sign off is "later" or "peace". or sometimes I just ~my name.

[Zelly]

Seconded to the later. It's normally ~Zell though...

[NikolaiI]

A person I talked to once an another site (deviantart.com) once signed his name with Namaste, which he told me was a Hindi word meaning "I salute the God in you," or something like that. Anyone else know what it means better? I don't usually sign with Namaste, though; usually a variety of other ones-- Yours, Yours truly, Sincerely, Love, I love you, Metta (friendship), Your friend, of cours Ttys (talk to you soon), Tty,-- maybe just my first letter A. with a period. The ending is part of the letter so it's important that it fits with the rest of the letter. I write Love in letters to all my family and close friends, but I don't have a need for building up to that when I write someone; we might and we might not but it's no big deal.

Anyway you could always leave off in midsentence. If the rest of the letter was educating and entertaining, well-written, I wouldn't care if you did that! :D :D

Love,
Alex
;)
Ack! Habit!

[Petrarch's Love]

hahahhahahah :lol: these are hilarious. could you please send me a PM that just says Cheerie-O or Toodle-Pip? :D


Expect one shortly. :D



uh? I didn't know you can write "Best" without "Wishes" following it or "All the" before it. is that very common or is it something only absent-minded professors do?

As far as I can tell it's a very common closing salutation in e-mails...but then I correspond with mostly absent-minded professors and soon to be absent-minded professors.:p


yeah, I so know what you mean! I didn't have to write too many e-mails to profs in England, but I could never bring myself to call my seminar tutor (who had a PhD) "Tess". I think I once managed to call a famous American Shakespeare prof (Carol Rutter) "Carol, can we use our dictionaries?" but it was sooooooooooo embarrassing :blush: When I had to write an e-mail, I always wrote "Dear professor X" and "thanks so much for your help". I only wrote "Dear Sherry" or whatever after they had signed with their first name once.


I agree...formal e-mails take me ages. And it was very hard in the UK because in Italy we're so much more formal...in the UK people call professors by their first name and say 'hello' to them! :eek:

The first name can be somewhat tricky with profs in the U.S. Generally they're professor so and so to undergraduate students and grad. students they don't know, but first names are more acceptable with grad. students they're working with. I call all my close advisers by first name at this point, but I generally don't go to first name basis unless a prof. has signed themselves that way in an e-mail or explicitly told me to use the first name.


One of my friends - American - would write emails to teachers without even a first line and without ending, just starting abruptly with her question, and ending either with her name or nothing :eek: In Italy doing that is soooo unpolite and some grumpy old professors even go mad if we don't use the most formal greetings, which are so old-fashioned.

I would clue your friend in that no one actually likes to get e-mails starting abruptly with a question and ending just as abruptly. Certainly ending without even signing your name could make it hard to know who you're responding to, and would tend to make responding to that message bottom priority. Perhaps some American professors are too subtle and non-confrontational on this subject, but I have certainly heard them complain extensively about their students' lack of e-mail etiquette among themselves. Students often don't realize how huge an amount of e-mail professors receive, which is probably the reason most profs don't feel they have the time to go about chastising individual abrupt messages. None-the-less the person who writes a rude or abrupt message is almost certain to have made a bad impression (or at least not a good impression), which is certainly not what the student wants when the prof. is later trying to decide whether to go higher or lower on a borderline grade. I know I certainly feel more kindly toward students who at least bother to tap out an address and a few lines of polite e-mail rather than (as one student once did) e-mail me for the first time with nothing but the line "We need to meet so you can tell me how to write a good paper." At the very least his name might have helped, since I had no idea who my demanding little paper writer might be. :lol:

[Virgil]

I agree...formal e-mails take me ages. And it was very hard in the UK because in Italy we're so much more formal...in the UK people call professors by their first name and say 'hello' to them! :eek: One of my friends - American - would write emails to teachers without even a first line and without ending, just starting abruptly with her question, and ending either with her name or nothing :eek: In Italy doing that is soooo unpolite and some grumpy old professors even go mad if we don't use the most formal greetings, which are so old-fashioned.

I've seen emails like that too. It's the younger generation I think, and they're used to text messaging rather than writing real letters. It annoys the hell out of me. Either when I get one like that or when one of the young enigneers working for me send it out like that.

[Koa]

I've seen emails like that too. It's the younger generation I think, and they're used to text messaging rather than writing real letters. It annoys the hell out of me. Either when I get one like that or when one of the young enigneers working for me send it out like that.

Young generation ok, but she's in the same generation as me ;) and I heard horror stories of people being literally shouted at by profs here in Italy for not using greetings that are so oldfashioned that are plain ridicolous. I felt really weird writing emails to my supervisor using only her first name, but she did sign only with that and she was my lecturer as well so I managed to do so. I always use "dear Prof X" but at the beginning of my student career in the UK for some reason I made the mistake to use "dear Mister/Mrs X" and one prof. told me off for that :blush:

[Dori]

I was writing a PM just now and for some reason I was at a loss as to how to end it.

Should I just stop typing when I have said what i needed to and push the send button? At work, I end all my emails with "Thanks" because I am usually requesting (telling) someone to do what they need to do so that the organization can keep operating and a "Thanks" is appropriate. And most of the work emails I get all end in "thanks" so when I was sending off my little private message, I was about to type thanks, realized i wasn't at work and sat there wondering what I should put.

I've seen "cheers" a lot on forums, but that's just not me. I typed bye and then thought that was kind of dumb. I don't PM that much and I don't know why I started obsessing about it. Does anyone else have PM hang-ups? Apparently, I don't PM enough!!

I know what you mean. I've received only 9 PMs. That's it! I've only replied to ~3 to 4 of them. Most of them say "thnx for the welcome" or something like that. I just end it after I've said what I had to say. I love PMing, but I often find myself at a loss as to what I should say. :(

[Shalot]

How about "Audi 5000"???:lol:

I just looked at some sent PM's and I'll either put my real name (usually that's if they told me they're name or I feel like I want the recipient to know my name) or I'll just stop typing.

I am going to start using Audi 5000. And Toodle Pip. And Peace Out. :lol: