We're all living in a hugely time pressed world, as people talk about drowning in emails and being crushed under the volume of their workload. As a result, we can't be confident that clients will read our emails - and the odds of prospects reading emails or answering voice mails seems to go down by the day. Reaching someone when we call is an increasingly rare experience, as more and more we communicate by exchanging voice mails or emails. (I recently had someone who built a successful pension management firm in the 1980s talk to my MBA class at the University of Toronto; one key to his success was that when he and his partners called prospects, in the pre voice mail age you could actually get people on the phone when you called).

In this new world where time is everyone's scarcest commodity, we need to adopt some new strategies to communicate effectively with clients and prospects via email and voice mail, two media that didn't exist twenty years ago (in fact email only was broadly adopted in the mid-to-late-90s). There are two principles that need to drive our strategy in using email and voice mail - less is more and sell the benefit upfront. There's a third that applies to voice mail - "raise energy."

"Less is more" was the credo of the minimalist architect, Ludwig Mies Van der Rohe (whose buildings include the TD Centre in Toronto) - but it applies equally to email and voice mail. We've all received voice mails which seem to drift on forever and emails which extend for pages. Here's a rule of thumb: Normal emails should be no more than 10 sentences (that's about the length of this article to the end of this paragraph), voice mails a maximum of 30 seconds. Yes, there will be the odd exceptions - but they should be exceptions. In the normal course, shorter is almost always better. (If you need to send a much longer email, consider putting it into an attachment, whose font is typically easier to read). As an aside, tech guru Guy Kawasaki advocates five sentences as the optimum email length.

"Selling the benefit of your message upfront" is just as important. The two most important parts of an email are the subject line and the first couple of sentences; the most important portion of a voice mail message is the first 5 or 10 seconds. The subject line of an email needs to draw readers in; the first couple of sentences of an email and the first 10 seconds of a voice mail have to succinctly summarize why you're writing or calling and "sell" the recipient on why reading or listening further and responding is worth their time.

There is a particular problem with voice mails which drone on endlessly with a level of energy and enthusiasm that sounds like the caller's dog has just died, while we wait impatiently for the caller to give us a key piece of information or to leave their number. It sometimes seems that callers are nonplussed when asked to leave a message - as if this is the first time this has happened to them. If you're calling someone, take five seconds first to jot down the two or three points you need to make - when leaving a voice mail, make a special effort to raise the energy in your voice and pick up the pace at which you talk. Being short, crisp and upbeat in your delivery will help get your message across and increase the chances that your call will be listened to and returned. (Here's a simple test: Call and leave yourself a voice mail message in your normal tone of voice - when listening to it, think about whether you're communicating the right level of positive energy and enthusiasm).

A final note: Few things are more infuriating than a caller who rushes or garbles their phone number, so that we have to listen to their message two or three times. Take special care to enunciate your number clearly - and consider leaving your number a second time at the end of your voice mail, in case the caller missed it the first time through.

Take the time today to reflect on how you're using email and voice mail - consider whether the "Less is more" and "Sell the benefit" strategies and raising your energy level on voice mails could help you communicate more effectively.