JS Tip 601: Some Best Practices for Email

Our friend Beth at Wells Fargo suggested a tip about email best practices. 

She asked us to address three areas:

• Scrap the long chains of email. Summarize what’s gone before: “The question is whether we should renew the loan on the Florida alligator farm.” You can store the originals on the cloud with a link: “To read the background, click here.”

• Use the “To” line for those who need to know, the “CC” line for those who would like to know. This is a judgment call. In the early days of Microsoft, Bill Gates installed a “Bozo Filter” to reduce the unimportant stuff.

• Use your subject line and the top of your document to drive the action. Use a signal word and a summary in the subject line: “Request for a Maserati as a Company Car.” Your reader knows the minute she reads your subject line, “This is a request. This is an action document.”

  Then put your action request within the first three sentences of the email: “The CEO offered me a company car of my choice when I rescued her dog from an alligator. Please arrange for a Maserati MC20.” 

  The distance of an action item from the top of the document is indirectly proportional to the document’s chances of success: The more you delay, the less your chances.

How’s that? What are your questions?

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