E-mail is a mainstay of most sales organizations now. We all know that.
But it amazes me how clueless some people (usually managers!) can be when it comes to the right and wrong way to e-mail people on their sales teams.
Here's what I'm talking about: When you send an e-mail, you have three choices in the way you list your recipients: via the "To" field, the "Carbon Copy" (Cc) field, and the "Blind Carbon Copy" (Bcc) field.
You probably use the "To" and "Cc" fields most often - but neither is your best option.
I suggest that you use "Cc" when you want to make your main recipient aware that you're sending the information to someone else. That you rarely, if ever, use multiple "To" entries. And that you use "Bcc" to send everything else.
"Bcc" is a replacement for "Cc" and multiple "To" entries. It's different, because it prevents recipients from seeing each other's addresses.
Why should you be gung-ho about "Bcc"?
- It keeps people's e-mail addresses private.
Whether for privacy's sake or as a means to reduce spam, some people don't want strangers to know their e-mail addresses. A banker I know put multiple high-profile addresses in the "To" field of an e-mail, and many of the recipients asked that he be terminated because of it!
- It protects people's privacy.
You may not want your favorite cousin to know that you still send your yearly holiday update to her ex-husband. Or your colleague may not want his employee to know that they're both on your wine-lovers e-list. Using "Bcc" keeps everyone anonymous, which can protect business and personal relationships.
- It increases readability.
From a sales perspective, this is the most important reason in my book. Listing 30 e-mail addresses in the "To" or "Cc" field looks unprofessional and takes more space on the screen. That makes it harder for recipients to find your actual message. Worse, it can make people feel that the e-mail is unimportant and not worth reading. I have an old sales manager friend of mine who still sends e-mails this way...and I've always thought it looks horrible.
So start using "Bcc" when you send e-mails to multiple people. It's polite, professional, and makes you look good. It could even save your job, or help you make a sale!
Dan,
I am of the opinion that the BCC is to be used when you want to hide who else is getting this mail from the main or public recipients. It is also a good way to send yourself a copy if you need one, or to make sure it is sending when you have connection trouble.
Depending on the email software you use, it is possible to create mailing lists that send the same message to each person on the list without showing any address at all. The problem with these is that they seem impersonal. I filter and bounce messages where my address is not in the TO CC or BCC fields.
What would be nice is to have the email sent to each person on the list with their address in the TO field. This can be done with a mail merge from Word or a database. Microsoft made it more difficult a few years ago, to cut down on SPAM, so you have to acknowledge each email as it goes out. If you have a short list that is not a problem.
Using systems like Lotus Notes can also reduce the address sharing and the length of the list at the top of the message.
Posted by: Roger Anderson | June 26, 2007 12:50 PM | Permalink to Comment