If the Word Count of your measured message is showing unnecessarily high, it's often because there is extra content in the html of the message that is being counted. This is especially true if you are adding or editing pre-header text or are copying a message that was composed in MS Word.
Cleaning Pre-Header Text
When viewing your message in Outlook, you can click on the Paragraph button (¶) in the Paragraph section of the Format tab of the ribbon. This will display "hidden" characters in your message, and allow you to delete unnecessary characters, such as dots or dashes.
Cleaning the Message in Word
If you are creating a message in Word to copy and paste into PoliteMail, you can follow the steps below to run the Document Inspector. This is a built-in feature of Word that will review your document for potentially unnecessary content, such as comments, personal information, custom XML data, or hidden text.
- From Microsoft Word and with your composed message open, go to File > Info.
- You can also see your word count according to Word on the right.
- Click on Check for Issues > Inspect Document.
- The Inspector will run and display an itemized list of what was found. You have the option to remove any item it finds.
- When finished, you can close the Inspector and return to your message to copy and paste it into PoliteMail.
Still Too High?
If, after doing these steps, the word count is still too high, you can always refer to this article to override the word count.
