How to ask for more on a written job offer without losing it

A written offer has landed and the number is lower than you hoped. You have one reply to get right: ask for too little and you leave money on the table, ask the wrong way and you risk the offer itself. This page shows the manual way to decide what to ask for and how to say it, using nothing but the offer letter and a notepad.

The manual method

Decide before you write a single word to the employer.

1. Decide your target number before you reply to anyone: the figure that would make you comfortable accepting, based on your research into the role and the market, not on the offer in front of you.
2. Anchor your ask above the target, inside a stated band, rather than naming the target itself; a target named as the ask tends to become the ceiling of the negotiation rather than the floor.
3. Write one sentence for email: state the ask, the band around it, and a plain question inviting the employer to respond.
4. Write a second, shorter version of the same sentence for saying out loud, in case the reply happens on a call rather than in writing.
5. Prepare a follow up for a yes: how you will confirm and what you will ask to have put in writing.
6. Prepare a second follow up for a no: whether you accept the original number, ask about non salary items, or decline, decided in advance so you are not choosing under pressure.
7. Read both sentences back once before sending, checking that the ask is a question, not a demand, and that no part of it reads as an ultimatum.
8. Send the email version, or say the spoken version, and wait for the reply before deciding anything further.

Cost in time: deciding a target and a band, once you already know your market research, takes five to ten minutes. Writing both sentences and both follow ups by hand, checking the tone each time, usually takes another ten minutes.

Where this goes wrong

• Naming a number first: stating your own figure before the employer has moved gives away the top of your range before the conversation starts.
• Giving a range with no floor: a band with only a top end reads as a wish list rather than a position, and an employer can settle at the bottom of it.
• A reply that reads as an ultimatum: language that leaves no room for a counter can turn a negotiation into a decision the employer makes alone.

The one-step way

Counteroffer runs the same idea in one file, in your own browser tab, with nothing installed and no account. Enter the offer, your target and the situation, and it hands back the number, the band, the message by email or spoken, and both follow ups. Try the free version, which covers the lowball situation, or visit the product page to buy the file, which covers all five situations, adds a printable one-page prep sheet and remembers your last entry between visits, 12.00 USD personal, 49.00 USD team, one purchase. This tool writes wording, not a prediction: it cannot know what any employer will do, and nothing on this page is career, legal or financial advice. A company that wants every desk covered can take the Source and Intranet Licence, all six tools with their source, one purchase.

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