Subject Line Messages

I read this tip on an on-line forum and was so impressed with the beautiful simplicity of it that I decided to share it with everyone I know. Unfortunately I didn’t record the details of this forum so apologies to the author – if he or she is reading this please let me know who you are so I can publicly acknowledge your wisdom.

How often do you send colleagues or friends short, one-line email messages? Something along the lines of: "Staff meeting in my office at 3:00 today" or "Great job on the proposal, go ahead and send it."

Here's a trick for saving them some time when they receive it:

Place your entire message in the Subject line of the note and follow it with "- eom" like this: "Staff meeting in my office at 3:00 today - eom" or "Great job on the proposal, go ahead and send it - eom".

The acronym "eom" stands for "end of message." When a message like this shows up in your recipient's inbox, they'll see "- eom" in the subject line and know they don't need to waste time opening it. The entire content of the message is right there in the Subject line.

N.B. You will need to explain this time-saver to your audience, at least the first time, in case they don't know what "eom" means.