Simplicity in email

Boy, everyone is on the simplicity/brevity soapbox. It makes sense given all that we are bombarded with. See John Porcaro: mktg@msft: Don't Make Me Read for a good discussion of the importance of brevity in email.

Actually, this is the origin of our Marketing ABCs™ formula. We had to figure out a simple, standard way to keep our emails to Microsoft execs and teams short, simple and effective. And this was before spam.

It became a really simple equation. Three lines only:
A = the situation (quick explaination/assessment)
B = what's the issue with A (why it's urgent)
C = is what action you require of the reader (approval, resources, input, etc.)

Because it was simple it worked. This has now become a technique we and tons of others we know use to simplify the process of thinking about and communicating tons of things from market analysis, to your vision and mission to your investor pitch.