Open with "Dear Ms. Alvarez," or "Dear Mr. Okafor," when you have never spoken to the CEO. Switch to "Hi Priya," only after they have signed an email to you with their first name, or after you have talked. Everything else on this page is a variation on that rule, plus what to do when you are unsure of a title or a name.
People tend to overthink the greeting and underthink the name, so the table comes first and the harder cases follow.
The greeting for each situation
| Your situation | Greeting | Sign-off |
|---|---|---|
| First email, big or traditional company | Dear Ms. Alvarez, | Sincerely, or Best regards, |
| First email, startup or founder-led company | Hi Priya, or Dear Priya Alvarez, | Best, |
| They replied and signed with a first name | Hi Priya, | Best, |
| CEO holds a doctorate or a medical degree | Dear Dr. Okafor, | Sincerely, |
| You cannot tell a woman or a man from the name | Dear Chris Harmon, | Best regards, |
| Their assistant or chief of staff wrote back | Hi Dana, (the assistant's name) | Thank you, |
| Writing to a board or a company, no name found | Do not send yet. Find the name first. | Not applicable |
Why title and last name is the safe opening
Purdue University's Online Writing Lab, whose business-letter guide is one of the most widely used, says a first name is acceptable only when you know the person and normally address them that way. Otherwise it recommends the personal title and last name. Its advice for uncertain titles is practical: if you cannot tell which title a woman prefers, use Ms., and if the person might hold a doctorate, use the higher title, because people rarely mind being addressed with a higher title than they hold.
That guide was written for letters, and email is looser. The CEO of a ten-person software company is likely to find "Dear Ms. Alvarez" stiff and will not care. The CEO of a regional bank may care. Starting formal costs you one word of stiffness. Starting too casual with the wrong person costs you the reply, so formal is the cheaper mistake.
Matching the CEO instead of guessing
You can often learn how a CEO writes before you write to them. Look at three places:
- Their own LinkedIn posts and the company blog. Contractions and first names suggest "Hi Priya." Full sentences and corporate phrasing suggest "Dear Ms. Alvarez."
- How the company signs its public emails, such as press releases and newsletters.
- The name they use for themselves. If the site says "Priya Alvarez, Founder and CEO" and the newsletter is signed "Priya," a first name is fine.
Say a founder named Lena is writing to Tomas Ruiz, CEO of a 40-person logistics firm in Ohio. His LinkedIn is mostly short posts that open "Quick note on..." and his company newsletter is signed "Tomas." Lena opens with "Hi Tomas," and she is on firm ground. For the CEO of a 4,000-person insurer who never posts, she opens "Dear Mr. Ruiz," and drops to his first name only after he does.
When you do not know the name or the gender
Purdue's guide covers both cases. If you do not know a reader's gender, it suggests a salutation without a title: the full name, as in "Dear Chris Harmon," works. If you do not have the person's name at all, it says to do some research, such as calling the company or speaking with employees. That advice holds for email. "Dear CEO," and "To whom it may concern," tell the reader you did not do the work, and a message that opens that way is the easiest one in the pile to delete.
Finding the name takes a few minutes: the company's About or Team page, the state business registry, a recent press release, or their LinkedIn page. There is more on the options in how to find decision makers at a company.
Titles that trip people up
- Founder versus CEO. Use whichever the company's own site uses. If it says both, either works in the body. The greeting only needs a name.
- Sir and Madam. Skip them. They read as a form letter.
- Mr. and Ms. in the subject line. Leave the title out of the subject. Put the reason you are writing there instead.
- Dr. Use it only if the person holds the degree, and use it for every email in the thread once you start.
- A name you cannot pronounce. You are writing, so you do not have to say it. Copy it exactly from their site, with accents and hyphens.
A short email with the greeting in place
Subject: Question about yard scheduling at Ruiz Logistics
Dear Mr. Ruiz,
I run a scheduling tool for trucking yards, and I noticed your Dayton site added a second gate last spring. Do you plan the dock slots by hand today, or does someone at the yard own that?
If someone does, I would be glad to send them a two-line summary instead.
Best regards,
Lena Park
lena@example.com
The greeting and the sign-off match each other. "Dear" goes with "Best regards" or "Sincerely." "Hi" goes with "Best." Mixing them, such as "Dear Mr. Ruiz" followed by "Cheers," looks like you pasted two templates together.
A second message after no reply
Keep the same greeting on the follow-up and send it in the same thread. Do not move to a first name because they stayed silent. Familiarity has to come from them. One follow-up a week later is enough for a CEO, and a third message to the person who owns the company reads as pressure. For longer advice on the email itself, see how to email a CEO, and for greetings across every kind of buyer, see the salutation guide for cold email.
A check before you press send
- The name matches the company's own site, letter for letter.
- The title is one they hold, not one you assumed.
- The greeting and sign-off match in tone.
- The first line says why you are writing, in one sentence.
Getting the name and greeting right for hundreds of CEOs by hand is dull work, and it is where mistakes creep in. Rocketship finds the person, reads their company's own website before the first email and writes to them by name. What Rocketship is explains how, and the plans show what a short list costs to try.