How Can I Use ChatGPT to Draft Professional Emails?

Do you find yourself spending too much time crafting emails at work? ChatGPT can help.

Clear, concise, and polite emails can make a significant difference in how your message is received and how you, as the sender, are perceived as a professional. Yet, writing emails that hit the mark often feels like a chore and can consume a lot of productive time.

Are you aware that many have already used ChatGPT to craft professional emails, reducing the time spent on email drafting and ensuring their emails are clear, concise, and professional in language?

You can do it too. We have a few tips for you in this article.

Benefits of Using ChatGPT to Write Emails vs. Writing Them Ourselves

Using AI to write professional emails is a relatively new idea for everyone. We get it, but may we also suggest it’s just a matter of time before this becomes the norm.

And if you’re hesitant to even try it out, may we ask you to consider the three benefits below. See if they outweigh your concerns.

1. Time Efficiency:

Instead of spending minutes or even hours crafting the perfect email, allow ChatGPT to reduce the effort required for you (significantly!) It can quickly come out with a draft in just minutes or even seconds. You’ll still spend time providing instructions to ChatGPT about the email message and expectations, but you can rely on it to take away the most tedious part of writing an email—the writing itself!

2. Clarity, Precision, Error Reduction:

ChatGPT is trained to craft clear and concise messages, reducing the likelihood of misunderstandings in your emails. Additionally, the emails it generates will be free of grammar, spelling, and punctuation errors. This ‘machine precision’ is what you’re looking for in polished professional emails.

3. Idea Generation:

Not sure how to start? Feeling stuck somewhere in your train of thought? Having a hard time finding the most fitting words? Not sure how to organize your messages into a logical flow? These are all too familiar to us. Brainstorm with ChatGPT. The help you need is just a prompt away!

Steps to Craft Professional Emails with ChatGPT

Step 1: Setting the stage

To tailor the email to your requirements, you need to ‘set the stage’ by providing the following initial information:

1. Background information and context:

Provide ChatGPT with basic background information about the recipient(s) and the purpose of your email. For example, you can mention if it’s a follow-up email, a request for information, or a response to an inquiry. Additionally, include key details such as the recipient’s role, the context of previous interactions, and any specific points you want to address.

2. Tone and Formality:

Should ChatGPT adopt a formal, semi-formal, or casual tone? What level of formality should it go for? Specify the tone and style you desire in your prompt. For example, you can say:

The email is for a colleague that I am working closely with. Please write it in a friendly but professional tone.

3. Specific Instructions:

Effective workplace communication often hinges on nuances – which the AI would not be able to pick up unless guided. So you may need to include additional instructions to guide it. The more detailed and clear your instructions, the closer the output will be to your expectations. An example prompt is:

My colleague is a non-technical person, so please explain in layman's terms and avoid technical jargon.

Step 2: Outlining and Composing the Email

As much as we can’t wait to see ChatGPT complete the email in the next minute, there are yet a few more steps to go through to ensure its writing is to the point. Well, in fact ChatGPT won’t even know what to write about without the following!

1. Key Points:

What are the key points that your email should cover? Tell ChatGPT about these in bullet points. Emphasize your key messages to help ChatGPT produce better results.

2. Prior Communication:

If you are writing to reply to a previous email, share this context with ChatGPT. You can copy and paste the entire email – but we would like to warn you about potential privacy and confidentiality concerns. It’s safer to summarize it in point form and feed it to ChatGPT.

3. References:

If there are certain materials you want ChatGPT to refer to while crafting your email, provide them as well. Guide ChatGPT on what to look for if necessary.

After the above is provided, you can request ChatGPT to generate an outline of the email before it proceeds to compose the full email. This allows you to review and confirm that it captures the key points and messages.

Otherwise, if you are confident enough in how ChatGPT fares, you can skip the outlining step and directly ask it to generate the email.

Step 3: Your Due Diligence

Let us be frank with you: It’s rare that you will get the most fitting email from ChatGPT without some review.

ChatGPT is a machine after all. While it’s great at assisting us and reducing our workload, it can’t completely take over the task (yet). And it’s known to make mistakes even with the best guidance from humans. So you must review its outputs – in this case, the email it composes for you.

The beauty of working with a machine is, you can freely point out the parts that it has not done right without any hard feelings. If the instructions and information you supplied in Steps 1 and 2 are clear and specific, it shouldn’t take too many iterations to get your email right.

Again, let us stress that you have the due diligence to make sure the email it outputs is correct.

Step 4 (Optional): Email subject

If you’re replying to an email, obviously your email subject will be the same as the original email’s subject, prefixed with “Re:” to indicate it’s a response.

But if you are starting a new email thread, you can get ChatGPT to come out with a subject line that is clear, concise, and relevant to the content of your email.

Try asking ChatGPT to suggest a few alternatives until you get the most satisfying one.

So here we have it! A workflow to get ChatGPT to write professional emails for you to reduce the productive time you spend struggling with drafts, and at the same time produce polished, professional-looking emails that are clear, concise, and free of embarrassing linguistic errors.

Happy emailing with ChatGPT!