If this were a Friends episode — which is becoming a recurring premise in these show notes — this would be "The Other One About Writing." Guest Grace Aldridge Foster shares her passion for that most essential element of email, writing!

How would it feel to face a room full of Green Berets and tell them their writing needs some work? Grace sheds quite a bit of light on that, as she's done it repeatedly! Even top-notch soldiers, according to Grace, often need to work on their writing skills — including email. BLUF - Bottom Line Up Front — doesn't always do the job.

This conversation wanders as much or more as the average email thread, but at heart it's a couple of people who value and care about the power of language comparing notes on the challenges of using language effectively and well in now-mostly-digital channels. Are reverse-threaded email messages just DUMB? Why do we still do that? If you use the right emoji, did you just make a faux pas that tells everyone you're out of date? How the heck would you know?

Fair warning — if you listen to this conversation, which you should, you'll probably end up thinking "My company should hire BoldType to help everyone write just a LITTLE bit better. That would pay for itself 100x in a month."

Super-fun, super-smart, super-interesting guest. Don't miss this one.

Want a little glimpse of the future? About halfway into this conversation, Renards Skutels describes a recent experience that his agency Chatsmart engineered for a client. The client's customers engaged live with a WhatsApp GenAI chat agent — the example Renards gives is “I have dry skin in the winter.” The chat agent sent the customer a catalog of applicable products to solve the problem, and the customer purchased — all within the WhatsApp app.

In some countries — most particularly, China/WeChat — a complete in-app transaction cycle like this is commonplace. It's pretty cutting-edge for the EU, though. While WhatsApp appears to have the user-preference edge, Meta is playing catch-up to WeChat on the supporting technologies required.

For North America, it's like a peek into a multiverse future, where the winning reality isn't set yet. Is Renard's story an example of

• How Amazon will function in a few years?
• How Canadians — and perhaps Americans — will use WhatsApp in the near future?
• Or — wildcard — how RCS might seize the pocket as Apple and Android play cyber-detente / cold-war?

What does this have to do with email?

Well...everything. Email isn't going away, but it's less and less the first-habit communication channel. Chatsmart is working on the front lines of app marketing in the EU market(s). Market dynamics and culture are different there, to be sure, but ask yourself this...do you check your messages or your email first? Which do you look at immediately, and which later?

This conversation will make you think about how things might look in a few short years.

If you're growing a midsize business, and need to focus your team's time on the business rather than social media...give Wendy Pace a call. Wendy had the courage to be a guest on The Future Of Email when she's not really a big fan of email!

Pace Setting Media handles social media for companies; they're immersed in helping clients learn who their customers really are, and how to reach them (cost-effectively) on a wide range of social-media platforms — including email :-)

AI comes up a lot in the conversation, with divergent opinions on the probable outcomes. Will AI make credible, compelling video content — or more drivel? Will copy and writing get better? Wendy's clearly paying close attention to the space.

It's been said that email is the original social media. This conversation tends to suggest that opposite, at least in terms of social media as it operates circa 2024. The heavy hand of algorithms and filters in the social media space don't apply (at least, not as much) in the inbox. From Wendy's perspective, that's bad — too much email. From Matthew's perspective, that leaves the person in control albeit with an additional workload.

If you're starting to think that you're under-utilizing social media and/or email to grow your business...give this conversation a listen!