Sim­ple advice on how to phrase ques­tions when seek­ing advice: use the active voice and ques­tion marks.

When seek­ing infor­ma­tion from busy peo­ple via email the lit­tle things mat­ter. Quick, minor tip: use a ques­tion mark if you’re ask­ing a ques­tion. Com­pare the fol­low­ing cases:

Case A: Do you have any feed­back for me on this point?

Case B: I would be inter­ested in hear­ing your feed­back on this point.

As a com­men­ta­tor points out, there is a third case, to be used with cau­tion: What are the three most impor­tant items of feed­back you have for me?