Business English: common abbreviations and acronyms you should know

Who’s the CEO of your organization?

Meetings are usually held at HQ. Where is this?

FYI, an abbreviation or acronym is a shortened form of a word or phrase and below is a list of some common ones used in business you should learn ASAP.

List of Business English abbreviations and acronyms for efficient communication:

Ad – Advertisement;

Approx – It’s a shortened form of the word approximate or approximately;

ASAP – As Soon as Possible;

ATTN – It’s usually used in letters, emails and memos: Attn: + [name or title of person];

B2B – Business-to-business. It refers to companies – or salespeople – who sell products to other businesses, rather than selling them to consumers;

Cc – Carbon Copy. It means that a duplicate copy has been sent to another person;

CEO – Chief Executive Officer; the person with the most important position in a company;

Co – Company;

CRM – Customer Relationship Management. It’s a software program that lets companies keep track of everything they do with their existing and potential customers;

CTA – Call to action. It’s a marketing term that refers to the next step a marketer wants its audience or reader to take;

Doc – Document;

e.g. – Example Given;

ETA – Estimated Time of Arrival;

Fwd – Forward. Email forwarding, for example, refers to the operation of re-sending an email message delivered to one email address to a possibly different email address (es);

FYI – This is an acronym for the phrase: For Your Information;

HQ – This stands for Headquarters, or the main office of a business organization;

i.e. – It means In Other Words;

ISO – International Organization for Standardization (an international organization that develops standards for things such as quality management, food safety management, and environmental management);

Memo – Memorandum. It’s a short note written as a reminder;

N/A – Not Applicable. It means that information is not given because it is unnecessary or irrelevant;

Pls – It’s the short form for please. Use it in informal communication with colleagues or peers;

PO – This stands for Purchase Order, which is an official document issued by a company to a specific seller for items that it intends to buy;

PS – Post Script, which is a short message at the end of an e-mail;

ROI – Return On Investment;

RSVP – Répondez s’il vous plaît, French for please reply;

SEO – This abbreviation is used in the field of Information Technology (IT) or MKT (Marketing) to refer to Search Engine Optimization, a technique to attract visitors to your website from search engines like Google;