When we're smart with our time, we spend less of it doing useless things, like scrolling mindlessly through our inboxes. Our proposed solution: an inline response, but not simply inline replying in general.

What does “respond inline” mean when it's truly done properly? Inline replying is the practice of replying to a message within the main body of the email, rather than writing your own email from scratch.

Inline reply is already a normal thing that most of us already do from time to time—in fact, we would argue that it's something that should be used much more often. We've got a few rules that you can keep in mind to maintain inline email threads that are always organized and easy-to-follow.

Inline Email: Meaning, We're Replying to Email Wrong Every Day

The opposite of inline replying is something called “top posting”—this is where you hit reply to an email and just start typing at the top of the text box.

This is how the majority of email messages today are composed. Unless you're dealing only with extremely simple email conversations, top posting can cause all sorts of problems.

The difference between top posting and inline replies.

First of all, when top posting, referring back to the original email becomes a huge hassle. You end up scouring through email after email to find what you're looking for. You then have to scroll back down to the original email you were composing to paraphrase what you've just found, out of context, and often missing salient points.

Sometimes, a recipient might reply to your email in an entirely new email. Your conversation is now happening in two or more separate threads, and it all could have been avoided with an inline email response.

If you're part of a group conversation, things can get even messier. Keeping track of who replies to what, when, and beyond becomes a nearly impossible feat.

Related: How to Send an Email

Inline Replying Is the Solution

Instead of top posting, we should be replying inline—that is, from within the body of the original email message.

In Outlook and Apple Mail, you can see the original message as soon as you hit reply. In Gmail, just press the three dots at the bottom of the compose screen to show the whole conversation. To remove the vertical quote line from your reply in Gmail, highlight the entire email and click the indent less button.

Inline replying means you'll never need to scroll through message after message again. The original email is included and searchable, right next to the most recent message you've received in that conversation.

Plus, you won't have to waste time paraphrasing other people's messages, or copy-pasting snippets of emails just to put your own inline reply into context. With inline replies, everything is there for everyone to refer back to at any time.

How to Reply to an Email Using Inline Replying Properly

When most people reply inline, they simply write their inline replies alongside the text that they want to respond to, calling this text out in bold or red.

This is far from ideal. If someone opens the email in plain text, they won't be able to see this formatting. And, as soon as you invite a couple of other people into the thread, things can get messy fast.

Illustrating the reason to reply inline to email.

Here are a few inline email tips and tricks that can help keep confusion to a minimum.

1. Don't Rely on Formatting

As mentioned previously, a recipient may not always be able to see the formatting that you include in an email (they might prefer plain text on their end, for example). If someone is color-blind, they may find it difficult to follow threads containing multiple colors.

Use formatting to make replies easier to find when scanning an email, but not as your only means of self-identification. This next point is a much more reliable approach.

2. Preface Replies With Your Name

Rather than relying on formatting, get into the habit of prefacing all of your replies with your name and, if you need to be especially organized, the date. Ask all recipients to do the same.

Identifying yourself in an inline email reply.

Currently, in Gmail or in the Outlook web app, you have no choice but to type your name in manually. If you use Outlook Desktop, however, there's a feature that will automatically preface your replies with your name.

To do this, go to File > Options > Mail. Then, go to Replies & Forward, check the Preface comments with the box, and type your name in. When you reply in the body of an email, your name will appear in brackets automatically.

Related: Save Time and Effort With These Professional Email Tips

3. Use Line Breaks, Please

Whenever you leave an inline reply, it should be on a new line, rather than inserted mid-sentence or at the end of a paragraph.

This makes it easier for other people to reply to your comments and scan the conversation.

4. Indent Multi-Level Replies

When multiple points are being addressed in one email, you'll have multiple threads happening within a single message.

To keep these organized, you should indent threaded replies so that it's obvious which comments relate to each point. I personally find using angle brackets (>) to be the most intuitive character to choose, as bullet points may not always show up in plain-text emails.

How to make an inline email reply easier to follow.

5. Last Resort: Use a Different Tool

Inline replying is the best way to keep projects moving forward. It also helps everyone keep on the same page without wasting time troweling through the history of the conversation. Still, some find this solution to be overly-complicated, unnecessary, and difficult to follow.

Communication tools like Slack, Yammer, and Huddle can help your team ease the pain of electronic communication. All three make a great email alternative or supplementary solution if your crew is struggling.

Related: Email Tips for Writing a Powerful Subject Line

Spread the Word

These simple inline reply rules all make for a much smoother transaction every time you and a colleague have a lot to discuss via email.

Who knows? You might just end up being the one who converts them to this way of working. There really is no downside; the difference becomes obvious in no time at all.