Professional vs. Friendly Emails: The Art of Mixing Tones in Email Marketing

Imagine a job applicant sent you a message saying “Hey fam! Just droppin’ u a quick note 2 say I’d totes rock at this job – lemme know when I can start!”, you’d likely dismiss their application immediately, regardless of their qualifications. Similarly, in email marketing, the tone you choose acts as your brand’s voice, directly influencing how your audience perceives and engages with your message.

While it might be easy to choose your tone in most other spheres, email marketers have a unique problem—you want to sound professional, but at the same time, you want to sound as friendly and human as possible. As confusing as this might sound, it is the way to reach your audience and truly resonate with them. So read on as we demystify the art of writing marketing emails that carry just the right tone. 

Defining Professional and Friendly Tones in Email Marketing

The tone of your email refers to the emotions that flows through your message. These emotions shape how readers perceive and respond to your email communications. While it might sound like your brand voice, it is slightly different. 

Unlike your brand’s voice, which remains consistent as your company’s distinct identity, your tone is dynamic and adaptable. That is, it is meant to shift from confident to empathetic, formal to friendly, or direct to collaborative depending on your message’s context and goals. 

Think of voice as your brand’s personality, while tone is how that personality expresses itself in different situations to achieve specific objectives. 

Email tone is an important part of emails, because unlike face-to-face interactions, you can’t use facial expressions or body language to convey your message’s true intent. Whether you’re aiming to sound professional or friendly, your tone must ensure your message isn’t just read, but felt and understood exactly as you intended. 

Interestingly enough, this emotional connection isn’t just about clarity—it’s about impact. Studies show that ads that convey emotions perform twice as well compared to those with only rational content. 

Now that you get the idea, what makes a professional tone different from a friendly one?

Key differences between professional and friendly tones 

The more you write, the more you will see that the lines between a professional tone and a friendly tone are not exactly rigid. While there are clear extremes to avoid (like the overly casual language in the introduction), the most effective email marketing often blends elements of both tones. 

That said, here are some notable differences between the two tones:

Language and style 

A professional tone employs formal vocabulary, and grammatically complete sentences. It avoids contractions (using “cannot” instead of “can’t”), slang and makes use of industry-specific terminology. In contrast, a friendly tone uses everyday language, contractions, and conversational phrases. 

Structure and formatting 

Professional emails follow strict formatting rules starting with proper salutations (“Dear Mr. Smith”), clearly organized paragraphs, and formal closings (“Best regards,” “Sincerely”). 

A friendly tone on the other hand can be more flexible, often using casual greetings (“Hi!” or “Hey there!”), shorter paragraphs, and relaxed closings (“Cheers” or “Talk soon!”).

Purpose and content 

A professional email should focus on delivering clear, objective information while maintaining business relationships. These emails stick to relevant facts and avoid personal details. 

Friendly emails, however, might include personal touches, shared experiences, or casual observations. These extras are a way to catch the reader’s attention, build rapport and create a more personal connection with the reader.

Use of emojis and abbreviations 

When writing professional emails, you should not include emojis and abbreviations. This helps you keep to the serious and businesslike approach that these messages need. 

While friendly tone emails might incorporate emojis, their use has to be strategic. You are not just stamping random emojis. Instead, you want to use emojis in important parts of the emails like in the subject line to convey emotions. 

On the other hand, abbreviations (like “FYI” or “ASAP”) help you add a more relaxed and approachable feel to your emails. 

When to Use Professional vs. Friendly Tones in Email Marketing

You already know that you have to switch between friendly and professional every time you send your emails. But how do you know when to pick which one. Usually, your choice will depend on the purpose of your message, audience expectations, and the context. 

For you to understand, here are some pointers on how to use these email tones:

When to use professional tone

• Legal and financial communications: When you are writing your clients about policy updates, terms of service changes, billing notifications, or anything along these lines, it’s best to keep things professional. Discussing such issues with a friendly tone might reduce clarity of your message.  Also, strict professionalism ensures that your readers are compliant while building their trust.
• Crisis management: One part of business that is, sadly unavoidable is crisis. Studies have shown that 59% of companies go through these terrible times product recalls, PR issues, stolen data and more. In such difficult times, communicating with your customers is one of the best ways to move forward. During sensitive situations or company issues like these, writing in an overly friendly tone might seem like you are making light of the situation. However, a professional tone conveys reliability and competence. In such moments when trust might be on the line, it is a rate way to maintain confidence those that matter to your business.
• B2B Communications: Depending on the industry where you are, formal communication might be the best way to reach out to other businesses. If you are in conservative industries, for instance legal services or let’s say finance, you have to keep to a professional tone. Imagine receiving an email from your investment banker with “Hey there! Just wanted to let you know your portfolio’s crushing it!” – such casualness would likely damage their credibility and your trust.

However, if you operate in more dynamic sectors like digital marketing, creative agencies, or tech startups, you have greater flexibility with tone. These industries often embrace a more conversational style that balances professionalism with approachability, reflecting their innovative and forward-thinking nature without compromising business credibility.

When to use friendly tone 

• Welcome and onboarding: You need to set a tone that is welcoming and signals an ongoing relationship when you have new customers. While you still want to stick to professionalism, a very professional, corporate-style welcome message might make you sound distant. Instead, use warm, approachable language so your new subscribers feel genuinely valued and comfortable with your brand. 

• Product launches for consumer brands: Product launches are the best opportunities to connect with the emotions of your customers using enthusiasm and conversational language. These two key components of a friendly tone help you create excitement with your customers. Your goal here should be to send messages that speak to the heart of your customers—like a friend recommending a product to another. 

• Social media-tied campaigns: Even for companies in very conservative industries, social media communication is slightly more personable. This is because social media interactions thrives on personality, and relatability. 

So, if you are sending emails that are related to social media campaigns, you don’t want to make them professional emails. Instead, you should aim to match that casual, engaging tone that social media platforms typically have. This approach isn’t about being unprofessional, but about speaking the language of your audience in a way that feels natural and approachable.

When to use mixed approach:

• Customer support: Customer support is a crucial area where you will need technical problem-solving and human connection skills. You need to maintain professional standards while helping clients but then, adding a sense of kindness and friendly empathy is also very important. You may not know but 96% of customers prefer companies that are empathic 

So, when sending emails with technical assistance, you should sound friendly yet professional like a helpful colleague walking you through a solution at work.  This will help you resolve issues effectively while you build long-term customer trust and loyalty.

• Product updates: Technical product information are not the best things to read for users. That’s because they are usually too long and sometimes boring to read. But then, you don’t have to go that route all the time. You can still write concise emails that are professional and free of technical jargon. 

To communicate effectively, try breaking complex updates into digestible, approachable explanations that keep users informed without overwhelming them. Your emails should be technically accurate, understandable and conversational. This ensures that users understand your new features and how useful the features will be for them. You want readers to see your messages and get excited to see the products.  

• Educational content: When sharing expert knowledge, the goal is not just to inform but to truly educate and engage. A mixed communication approach allows complex topics to be presented with academic rigor while maintaining a conversational tone that invites learning. 

By breaking down sophisticated concepts into relatable explanations, educational content can transform from intimidating monologues into meaningful dialogues that make sophisticated information accessible and genuinely interesting to diverse audiences.

Examples Illustrating the Differences

Before we end things, let’s see how some industry experts write emails with professional, friendly and a mixed approach 

Professional email example

The email you are seeing below is an example of what a professional tone should look like. For a company discussing the Olympics and business initiatives, this is an appropriate form of communication. 

The email starts with a formal salutation “Dear Subscriber,” which maintains professionalism while being inclusive of their audience base. Reading through the professional email, you will notice a consistent use of precise, formal language throughout: (“With the world convening in Paris for the Olympics”, “As a Franco-American company, we’re delighted to witness this global harmony”, “We believe Technology and innovation can benefit the world”). While the language is sophisticated, it is  clear enough. Plus the writer cleverly avoids using any casual expressions, colloquialisms and emojis(even in the subject line).

The email further demonstrates professionalism through its proper date format of “August 1, 2024” at the top of the page, It has well structured paragraphs that maintain a clear business focus while retaining a warm tone. The professional closing with “Sincerely” followed by the name and title (George Eid, Founder, CEO) further reinforces its business-appropriate nature. 

Friendly email approach 

Now we want to see a friendly email tone. Unlike the professional tone above, this email starts with ‘Hi’. The writer then goes further to brilliantly establish an enthusiastic and personal connection from the start with its casual yet genuine headline“FEELING THE LOVE…” (notice the and the heart emoji). The email continues with warm, conversational language like “Wow! What a crazy, fun few weeks it’s been.” 

The casual, conversational style continues throughout with phrases like “We love feeling your excitement” and references to “unboxing videos,” making the message feel personal and relatable. 

The email maintains this warm casual tone while still delivering important business information about new products and future plans.

Mixed approach email example 

We have seen the two sides of the coin, now let’s explore what a mixed approach should look like. For a creative platform like Kickstarter, this casual, encouraging yet professional communication style perfectly matches their brand identity. 

The email opens with an enthusiastic and personal greeting “We noticed you started a project on Kickstarter — awesome!” This immediately establishes a warm, supportive tone that makes the reader feel recognized and celebrated. The exclamation points and the informal language choices help create an inviting atmosphere without appearing unprofessional.

Throughout the email, Kickstarter maintains this approachable tone with clear, simple language and helpful checkmarks guiding users through their next steps. These steps could have felt a bit overwhelming. However, with the clever use of phrases like “Getting a feel for the backer experience will help you be a better project creator” and “If you get stuck or just want a second opinion, share your project preview with a friend” it all feels like a friendly advice rather than corporate instructions. 

The email concludes with their logo accompanied by a heart emoji, which fits their brand personality while still maintaining credibility. Notice how the use of emojis does not get so much that it looks immature. 

To Sum Up

Now that you know how important tone is in your email marketing strategy, ensure you always choose a tone that aligns with the purpose of your message, the expectations of your audience, and the broader context of your brand. 

The beautiful thing is, there is no universal “right” tone. In most cases, you simply need to find a communication style that best serves your specific marketing objectives and brand identity. For instance, when communicating sensitive information, upholding compliance standards, or engaging with conservative industries, a professional tone. This will help you convey reliability, expertise, and trustworthiness. However, a friendly approach can be useful for onboarding new customers, launching exciting products, and fostering connections on social media platforms.