With thanks to all who participated, here are the results of my latest weekend poll. Our focus: Do you routinely include a signature line when sending email messages?
Regards of one type or another top your closing lines
… followed by an expression of thanks. For those executives you most admire, it’s exactly the reverse; “thanks”, “thank you” or “Thanks!” top the list, followed by variations of expressions of regards. In .oth cases, though, regards and thanks dominatel
THE DATA
Note: Information below reflects the percentage of respondents who selected specific responses from multiple choice options. In instances where more than one person offers similar responses to an open ended question, I typically cluster or paraphrase such responses rather than duplicating all of them.
How do you typically say goodbye at the close of a business email message?
- Kind regards: 26% of respondents
- Thank you: 17% of respondents
- Best regards: 12% of respondents
- Thanks: 11% of respondents (7%: “Thanks.” and 4%: “Thanks!)
- Best: 4% of respondents
- With kind regards: 4% of respondents
- With best regards: 3% of respondents
- Sincerely: 2% of respondents
- With friendly regards/greetings: 2% of respondents
- Cheers: 1% of respondents
- 18% of respondents selected “Other”. Readers reported using the following closing words, in descending order of frequency of mention.
- Regards
- Many thanks
- Best wishes
- Kind regards
- Take care
- Smiles
- Regards
- “~Cindy”
- Best wishes
- All the best
- regards
- speak soon
- arigato
- warm regards
- “(It) depends on the recipient
- “Sometimes I don’t put anything after the text other than my signature”
How does the executive you most admire typically say goodbye at the close of a business email message?
- Thanks/Thank you/Thanks!: 22% of respondents
- With kind regards/kind regards: 18% of respondents
- Best regards: 16% of respondents
- Regards: 7% of respondents
- Cheers: 4% of respondents
- With friendly regards/greetings: 3% of respondents
- (insertion of) name (or first name) only: 5% of respondents
- 26% of respondents selected “Other” (the actual percentage was higher, but 6% of those responses aligned with other remarks mentioned above). Readers reported using the executives use the following closing words, in descending order of frequency of mention.
- (It) depends on recipient & subject matter
- With my very best wishes
- v/r
- Best wishes
- Many thanks
- nothing
- Best wishes
- Your partner
Great poll and of course, for me, my sign off is Yours Behaviourally!!
Thanks, Nick, and as to your own sign off … of course!
Enjoy seeing your polls. Wonder if the responses differed based on location/culture..”cheers” is British, so wonder if respondents were primarily outside the UK.
Thanks, Elizabeth, and I’d suspect that responses came from all over. You’re correct that “cheers” is popular with many Brits, but I know of a number of Canadians (myself included) who use it among our closing messages. As some readers noted, the choice of message may vary depending on the contact and more.