In an ideal world, we would provide full, informative, well-thought responses to every client email within 10 minutes of receipt. We would also eat ice cream for breakfast and not get fat. In the real world, there are a few reasons why you may not be able to respond right away:
- Sometimes you’re busy doing your job
- Sometimes you may only have part of the answer
- Sometimes you may have none of the answer
- Sometimes you literally cannot stomach one more interaction with this person and you just need them to give you a frickin’ minute
Unfortunately, while you may have many clients, your clients only have one you; and, for some of them, waiting an hour to respond is like waiting until next Tuesday. What I’ve begun to notice is — for most clients — uneasiness over response time is less about getting the requested information, and more about knowing when they’ll get the requested information.
In these cases, I use a holding email.
A good holding email does three things:
- Acknowledges receipt.
Note: you don’t have to say explicitly “I’ve received your email,” just responding will provide that peace of mind to the person on the other end. - Provides whatever information you have at that moment
Often, this is enough for them to get started and they’re happy to hold on for the remainder. - Provides a timeline
Let the client know when they can expect to receive the remainder of the information they’ve requested. Just be sure that you stick to the timeline.
For me, it usually looks like this:
Hi, Client!
Thanks so much for confirming your final guarantee. I’ll forward the event order for your review by EOD Friday.
Best Regards,
Amanda
That’s it. It’s so simple, but so useful.
