I hate getting emails that ask me for two or three time blocks that work for me. Be respectful of people's time and just pick a few times that work for you. If they don't work for them, they'll usually tell you what does pretty quick.
The only thing that bothered me about the way he did it was that he capitalized the TWO. This makes it looks like he thinks the VCs are retarded. (Maybe if most VCs think other VCs are retarded, this could have helped his case :)
I see you are trying to figure out the best way to schedule business meetings. I do this all the time as Chief Handshaker at FreshBooks. Are you free Monday at 2pm CST to discuss this? I can call you at 321-555-1212.
Cheers,
Sunir Shah, Chief Handshaker, FreshBooks
(416) 481-6946 x224
http://www.freshbooks.com/team/sunir
http://twitter.com/sunir
If you accept, I'll send you a meeting invite. I used to not send meeting invites but I found that in 15% of the cases people don't mark meetings in their own calendars.
My signature includes my contact information as well, which is useful later in the deal cycle. Don't make your phone number a mystery.
My only problem is who should suggest the first meeting time/place. By suggesting it yourself, you are assuming a position of seniority in the relationship that may not be appropriate, and project the image that their time is not as valuable as yours. I personally only suggest a time if I have reason to believe that the other person will be available then. For example, "Would you like to talk about XXX over coffee after the conference we'll both be at?" Otherwise, I let them know that I will make myself available whenever is convenient for them.
I cut down useless steps so I didn't waste time. I remained polite; I asked for the time, I didn't make it an order. I drove to an action to move the relationship forward. That's respect.
If they aren't available at the time you ask, they will take command and respond with times they are available. Then you defer.
A professor, for example, might assume that you have particular reasons for selecting the time slot you have and wonder whether he should clear room in his schedule to meet your expectations. In this case, selecting an exact time before hand provides a minor inconvenience to him.
With the amount of travelling that investors do these days, I'd be surprised if they could be caught at any time inside their home timezone. We also have internal people strung out from Korea to Hawaii, so we all use EST to time our calls with the market. For us, it's proven to be easier than a timezone back-and-forth. My two ♙.
I also ask for TWO more so that we reduce on email back and forth.
Its all about 1) less emails and 2) accommodating the investor. If he or she is already looking at the calendar for ONE time that works, sureley TWO more is not that bad and it increases the chances of getting a mutual time that works.
Did I understand your position correctly?
Clarity and conciseness are good, but the tone here came across as complacent/arrogant to me. Maybe it's a cultural thing; I'm a Brit, and often find US business people way too in-your-face to create a good impression and fit in well over here.
Probably no harm done in this case, because any successful investor surely cares more about the facts than the tone anyway.
Personally I'd tweak these templates in a different way, but that's the thing, their (great) templates and provide a good place to start. I always find that personal touches go a long long way in business.
I did not read it as: I want to pitch this over two time slots to you.