How to cure email blindness and reclaim your readers’ focus

Every morning I pour coffee, open my inbox, and brace myself for the flood of shiny, HTML monstrosities—coupons, announcements, rigid templates plastered in logos and multi-column nonsense. One look at those and I feel like a wallflower at a dance: I don’t belong, so I head for the delete key.

One day I decided to change course. I sent a plain-text email with one simple sentence: “I almost skipped breakfast until this weird hack saved me 20 minutes.” No images, no header, just my name, a blank line, and that lone sentence. My open rate doubled. Replies poured in: “What hack?” “Tell me more!” I had cured email blindness in an instant.

It turns out we all crave authenticity and human connection. We open emails from friends—so your job is to sound like one. Short, punchy lines. A dash of humility. A spark of curiosity. And never, ever treat people like clicking targets. When they feel you’re talking to them, not at them, they lean in—and that’s when your words start to sell themselves.

You begin by scrapping your logo-heavy templates and sending simple text emails. Use single-sentence paragraphs and write as you speak, peppered with contractions and genuine asides. Start with a gripping hook that jolts readers awake, then drop in an embedded command—like “Click here to see how”—and close with a clear, one-line cue. Do this in your next email and watch your open and reply rates jump.