Making the Death Announcement

A death announcement, or notice, is usually published in places where most of the people who knew the person who died would have seen it, for example, a newspaper, an e-mail, or social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter. A death announcement provides basic details about the person and their manner of death, including their name, birthdate, the date of their death, the location, and any arrangements for a funeral or memorial service. As a starting point on how to write a death notice, basic information that needs to be included should include full names (including maiden names), dates of birth and death, and location of death.

Since you will include location, dates, and times, as well as donor information, with your initial death announcement, this information should be available in advance. It is best to wait until after the funeral services are set for the date and time to put an announcement in your local newspaper.

Death notices are paid by the family or friend who places the announcement in the paper. You may want to find out first about the costs and deadlines. In some newspapers, obituaries are placed in the paper at no charge. 

At the very least, there are a few essential pieces of information that you will want to be included with a loved one’s death notification. Even if you are the closest person to the deceased, there may be important information that needs to be provided by other family members, or they may feel especially strongly about one aspect of a death announcement. Making a phone call to announce the death may be challenging, but this is the method preferred by those closest to the deceased.

Before I provide you with examples of email subject lines to use when you are making a death announcement about a family member (written to other family members), you may want to think hard about whether an email is an appropriate method for sharing this type of news. You would want to see the subject line that indicates that the email message contains important news, but you may not want to see the actual announcement of death until after you have opened the email. A death notice is typically paid for by the family of the deceased, and it will outline briefly the details of his death — his name, birthdate, funeral or memorial services, and so on.