I guess it's been a while since I blogged anything, and even more of a while since actively being on the ball. Nearly 17 years... The hiatus is nearly old enough to go to university.
There's so much to unpack (2 venture backed startups, being part of a few interesting teams in the in-betweens), and having dug so far into the past I could not have imagined the impact that these two clips from old, 2007 blog posts would have in my life:
There's so much to unpack (2 venture backed startups, being part of a few interesting teams in the in-betweens), and having dug so far into the past I could not have imagined the impact that these two clips from old, 2007 blog posts would have in my life:
I guess there’s always a target audience for simple to use programs :-)
and
After starting up the IRS application, I realized that it’s time someone puts up either a trusted website or a desktop application that is way more intuitive than the official application.
Anyhow, time to break it! But gently...
As the year turned, facing a longer weekend with a bit of time on my hands I felt the need to change a couple of things, which included setting up my hey.com account.
I had tried it a couple of times before, however this time I wanted to really give it a go. So far, I honestly think it's the best email client out there and this letter(? email? post?) should tell you why you should consider it as well.
Effortless email screening that sticks
Most of my email time is spent parsing whatever lands on the inbox. Years of conditioning make me not even think about it really but it's a bit of a silly way to spend time. Is it an invoice? Forward to Hubdoc. A newsletter? Delete, now it's a bad time but perhaps the next one. An email from a sales team that just learned about the Repeatable Revenue formula? Mark as spam and ban them to the shadow realm. Need to reply? Leave it on the growing pile of emails to be replied to.
Yup, I know all about Gmail filters. Click-click-click-click-click, break the flow as I click through the clunky interface to create a filter so that next time It Gets Parsed Correctly. It's like cutting down on carbs having grown in a country where more than a few meals come with a side rice and fried potatoes... I'll do it for a few days, at least which is better than nothing right?
The thing is, although I'm not like some people that have thousands of emails rotting on their inbox, I'm not religious about trimming my inbox either. Stuff piles on and, like a desk that somehow organically grew stuff on it, at some point I call it quits, take an afternoon off and start sorting it all out. At the end a small sense of accomplishment and inner peace.
Once email started trickling in I really caught up to the value of Hey's Screener: quick yes/no. Is it relevant and I want these emails? Click Yes. Is it a receipt? Send to Paper Trail. Need a reply? Reply later. Is it a newsletter? Send it to the feed. 2 clicks. The rule stick for any future emails. Job done.
It's like someone built this exactly for me. They didn't of course. But that's how it feels.
Yup, I know all about Gmail filters. Click-click-click-click-click, break the flow as I click through the clunky interface to create a filter so that next time It Gets Parsed Correctly. It's like cutting down on carbs having grown in a country where more than a few meals come with a side rice and fried potatoes... I'll do it for a few days, at least which is better than nothing right?
The thing is, although I'm not like some people that have thousands of emails rotting on their inbox, I'm not religious about trimming my inbox either. Stuff piles on and, like a desk that somehow organically grew stuff on it, at some point I call it quits, take an afternoon off and start sorting it all out. At the end a small sense of accomplishment and inner peace.
Once email started trickling in I really caught up to the value of Hey's Screener: quick yes/no. Is it relevant and I want these emails? Click Yes. Is it a receipt? Send to Paper Trail. Need a reply? Reply later. Is it a newsletter? Send it to the feed. 2 clicks. The rule stick for any future emails. Job done.
It's like someone built this exactly for me. They didn't of course. But that's how it feels.
It's not you, it's me...
Another of my favourite features is the Screen Out. As far as I understand it, this is not at all like Gmail's Block and Mark as spam.
Spam detection filters are pretty good nowadays. The days of a 411 scam or someone peddling viagra (is that still a thing) landing on your inbox are thankfully long gone.
But email services don't really give us an easy way to ignore senders. You either click-click-click-click to create a filter or take the lazy route and mark as spam. I get the spam reports all the time so it feels the latter is the norm. From password recovery, to payment receipts all the way to marketing emails.
If someone doesn't want to look at it, odd are they'll mark it as spam. I'm not that different. I do it too. Especially for lazy sales emails. Doesn't really matter that the email has an unsubscribe link. I don't scroll to the bottom and clearly neither do other people.
But marking as spam does have an impact. It impacts the business on the other end by decreasing their domain reputation. Sure, it's not relevant for me, but it doesn't mean that it won't be relevant for someone else. Let it land on their inbox.
Hey's Screen Out gives me an easy way to do what I want, which is to ignore the inevitable follow-up cadence, without impacting the other side because they're probably legitimately trying to get on with business (although in a very unsophisticated way).
Again, it's like someone built this exactly for me.
Spam detection filters are pretty good nowadays. The days of a 411 scam or someone peddling viagra (is that still a thing) landing on your inbox are thankfully long gone.
But email services don't really give us an easy way to ignore senders. You either click-click-click-click to create a filter or take the lazy route and mark as spam. I get the spam reports all the time so it feels the latter is the norm. From password recovery, to payment receipts all the way to marketing emails.
If someone doesn't want to look at it, odd are they'll mark it as spam. I'm not that different. I do it too. Especially for lazy sales emails. Doesn't really matter that the email has an unsubscribe link. I don't scroll to the bottom and clearly neither do other people.
But marking as spam does have an impact. It impacts the business on the other end by decreasing their domain reputation. Sure, it's not relevant for me, but it doesn't mean that it won't be relevant for someone else. Let it land on their inbox.
Hey's Screen Out gives me an easy way to do what I want, which is to ignore the inevitable follow-up cadence, without impacting the other side because they're probably legitimately trying to get on with business (although in a very unsophisticated way).
Again, it's like someone built this exactly for me.
Replying to everyone, all at once
I mentioned earlier that if there's someone I need to reply to, Hey let's me use the Reply Later feature. This puts the email on the pile, letting me process the email screening real quick while a cup is brewing.
At some point the "reply to emails" time block comes up, I open the Reply Later pile and write back to everyone in one go. None of the "open-reply-open next" faff. All the emails are in one page, ready for processing.
There numerous other small and incredibly nice touches throughout the app that raise the bar of the overall UX, but these are the 3 things that make Hey a winner for me.
Over the past 30 years of using the internet, I've tried plenty of email clients, ranging from whatever no-frills apps come with the operating systems to silly stuff like mutt and even contributing to some obscure open-source email clients.
Now that this one is out of the way, I'll try to set up a blog habit using Hey's new calendar and see if I can build a streak.
Thanks for reading.
At some point the "reply to emails" time block comes up, I open the Reply Later pile and write back to everyone in one go. None of the "open-reply-open next" faff. All the emails are in one page, ready for processing.
There numerous other small and incredibly nice touches throughout the app that raise the bar of the overall UX, but these are the 3 things that make Hey a winner for me.
Over the past 30 years of using the internet, I've tried plenty of email clients, ranging from whatever no-frills apps come with the operating systems to silly stuff like mutt and even contributing to some obscure open-source email clients.
Now that this one is out of the way, I'll try to set up a blog habit using Hey's new calendar and see if I can build a streak.
Thanks for reading.