Many people miss opportunities because they don’t make things easy when they ask for something.
I want to take this opportunity to highlight a few examples of “making things easy” done right so people know what this looks like.
Hiring
This is an email from my buddy David Fraga. Instead of making me hoof it over to the Shutterstock site to fetch all this information to forward along, he linked to it throughout the ask email. He even provided a link to a pre-populated search query for LinkedIn so that I didn’t have to figure out how to scan my network for potential candidates. This is a great example of making things easy.
Promotion
My friend Shaila sent me this email when she was trying to raise money for Entstitute. A lot of people just throw a link at you and say “hey can you do me a favor and share this! thanks.” Shaila went the extra mile and provided copy (with links) for both tweets and Facebook posts. She’s made the barrier to me following through as low as possible. Guess what? I did.
Inspiring Awareness
During cold outreach, I like to create a frame for my solution by highlighting the recipient’s problem. To maximize the effect, I try to make it incredibly easy for the recipient to verify their problem by linking to a clear demonstration of where they fall short. Here’s a hypothetical example I’d use if I was working for a commenting platform like Disqus.
Hi Mark,
I wanted to touch base because I noticed there’s no commenting functionality on your site….
The hyperlink would point to a destination on their site that evidences the exact shortcoming I’m referring to. When “Mark” reads this than clicks through, it very easy for him to verify he has a problem.
Asking for Introductions and Coffee
I’ve wrote posts on How to Ask For an Introduction and How to Ask For A Coffee Meeting before. Making it easy for the other person to fulfill your request is at the crux of both methodologies I propose.
Next time you ask for something, be honest with yourself – are making it as easy as possible for this person to follow through on your request? Making sure you are. It’s worth the extra few minutes.
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