The Inigo Montoya Email Method

Writing for Clarity and Response. Send Emails that Matter

Want to know the trick to get people to respond to your emails? 

Keep them short. 

This applies to everyone, regardless of the email you’re sending. No one wants to see a massive wall of text with everything they could ever want (or not want in this case) to know about you, your product or your service. 

I learned this the hard way. I’d often craft really lovely emails; reference emails with every single piece of data you might want to know attached, to show I really cared. I know you so well Mx Customer that I can give you every last piece of information, ever. 

This kind of email does have its place. If you know someone and they’ve asked for (and value) your data and commentary, then go for it. Otherwise, you need to think about these things;

1. Context - Do you know this person? Why are you emailing them? What are you trying to convey?

2. Persona - You can’t send the same email to your champion and your exec buyer. Personalisation is a must, but understanding the person you’re sending to is even more important.

3. Outcome - Are you sending something you want a response to or just something for them to read and file? If the latter, why? What’s the point?

Nice long emails with heaps and heaps of data are often going to be skimmed and likely misunderstood. The one piece of advice I have given to so many CSMs over the years is get your customers on the phone to tell them their usage story. Think about it; Do you want to read through the world’s longest email to interpret for yourself what’s happening? Is that valuable to you? 

Do you, as a CSM or Account Exec really want your customers inferring their own conclusions from the information you’re sharing?

Of course, you don’t.

You also want to build, or build on, a relationship with your champion or your exec buyer. You’re not going to do this over email. Getting in front of the customer, on Zoom or in person, is the only way to build strong working partnerships, so don’t shoot your load in an email they probably won’t read. 

So, unless you’re sending an email for the sake of it (don’t), to everyone you know (don’t), you’re going to want to keep it punchy. An email is and should be a catalyst for the next step and if you don’t know what you want that next step to be, I’d have a think about that before you go any further. 

The Inigo Montoya email method

You’ve seen The Princess Bride right? Of course you have, it’s like 40 years old at this point. And if you haven’t, go watch it, it’s amazing. 

Anyway, whilst I am probably not the first person to coin this method, it does absolutely increase response rates, especially from important people (Execs and C Levels) and from people you don’t know. I’ve used it multiple times over the years with multiple teams, and whilst writing a short email is so much harder than a long one (try it, you’ll see), it is always worth the effort.

Here we go;

👋 Friendly Greeting

💁‍♀️ Short Introduction

🤓 Relevant Fact

✅ Action Point or Next Step

Think short sentences, no more than 4. Keep it snappy. The goal here is to get in, say something interesting and then leave before you have a chance to start waffling about usage. 

Before you start drafting, think back from the outcome. If you’re trying to get a meeting with someone, then make sure the relevant fact is something that they’re going to want to discuss. “I’d like to discuss your usage” isn’t going to cut it. 

Try “Looking at your excellent usage, I’d love to explore how {x}, our new feature can save you over 50% of your time”, something compelling. In this instance, if it is a new feature, you can also hyperlink the release notes or tech docs, so they can review them if they want to. Don’t jump into a nice lengthy, detailed description of {thing}, trust me, it’s not interesting. 

What you always have to bear in mind is that you are one of probably 20 (at least) software vendors vying for time and attention. On the assumption that my 20 software vendors want an hour a month for business reviews, that’s the equivalent of half a week! Half a week just talking to CSMs and AEs about how well (or not), I’m using the thing I bought. You also need to consider how your exec buyer expects their team to be using the tools they buy. If I bought something because I needed it to do a specific job, and it’s doing it and everyone is happy, then why in the world would I want to talk to you about that?

There has to be some value. Something I need, or want to know, or something I want to talk to you about. Your customer doesn’t owe you any of their time. Especially if you’ve never met or spoken to this person before, you need to earn the right to speak to them. Just being their Account CSM isn’t in and of itself value - think about what it is that you can offer them, based on what their data is telling you and then distil this into one sentence that will make them want to talk to you about it.

This is hard. I have slaved away over the shortest emails, trying to get everything I want to say or allude to in a few sentences. However, it is worth it. The higher up the chain you go, the fewer words get sent in emails.  Review emails you’ve received from people at the C level from inside your own org (that weren’t company notices), they’re short, right? Time is money. Short emails convey experience and confidence, both things you have that you need to show.  

You want people to take you seriously. Show you respect their time with a short email that clearly articulates the point you want to make. 

“Hey there, 

I’m Lamps and I specialise in creating customer-driven growth engines. 

If you enjoyed this blog on emails, you’ll like my others which you can find here. I’m happy to help you curate your emails. Click this link to chat. 

Take care, Lamps”