How I Got Mark Cuban to Answer My Email in 7 Minutes Flat

Mark Cuban is famous for a lot of things–his 12 seasons on Shark Tank, his former ownership of the Dallas Mavericks, and his move to take down Big Pharma with his public benefit corporation Cost Plus Drugs. 

But the most fascinating, at least to me, is the billionaire’s reputation for answering cold emails. He makes his email address public and actually answers all manner of petitioners–especially founders looking for advice and funding. What’s remarkable is that he responds at all to cold emails; not that he responds to each and every one. That means every request must stand on its own merit. 

So, when Inc. recently decided to ask Cuban to participate in a story about how he manages his inbox, I volunteered to reach out. You see, I have 92,489 unread messages in my Gmail inbox, and I figured I could learn something from him.

In this case, the story idea seemed like a slam dunk–at least from our perspective. Who wouldn’t want to hear from Mark Cuban about how to manage their inbox? Granted, I wasn’t emailing him to ask for money. But time must be a close second in the value ranking of his resources. 

The question was: How to present our request in such a way that it would have its best shot at success? How could we craft it to rise above the noise? 

The editor in me took it as a challenge, and I drafted 10 versions of a note that I shared with a colleague. We agreed independently on the best option and sent off an email with this subject line:

For Inc. mag: Can you pls. Share 3 Tips to Manage Your Inbox?

And that was it–the entire message, contained right there in the subject line. The only text in the body of the email was my signature, so he could see who I was if he did decide to respond. It went out at 4:03 p.m. 

My intention was simply to show a measure of respect for Cuban’s time by being succinct. I went for a cup of coffee, and when I returned I was shocked at what I found: a response from Mark Cuban, time-stamped at 4:10.

Now, before you balk at the comparison between me, a journalist, and you, an entrepreneur, cold emailing Mark Cuban, please understand that the man doesn’t know me from a bar of soap. Yes, he’s graced the cover of Inc. twice in his storied entrepreneurial career. But we’ve never spoken, and the fact is that he does ignore plenty of requests. Out of the 750 or so emails a day he receives, he responds to at least 150, he previously told one Inc. reporter. Yet in seven minutes flat, I had the answers I needed.

The message is right there for you to decode, if you like. But I wanted to share my thoughts, as an editor, on why I think the email actually worked. IMO, it comes down to these three rules that all of us should follow when writing emails, whether we’re trying to get Mark Cuban’s attention or not:

1. Be clear

Can’t stress this enough. We played around with including “For Inc. mag,” debating if it was redundant given that “Inc.com” is part of my email address. But that approach would have made him work too hard to understand whom the request was from. Remember, Cuban doesn’t know me, and forcing him to study an unfamiliar email address even for a split second is a waste of time. Once you’ve got something you think is clear, read it out loud. And show it to someone smart. 

2. Be brief

If you can deliver your entire request in the subject line, for Cuban to ingest right there in the scroll of his inbox, do it. You’re cutting out an entire step between him and a decision. Maybe you can’t capture the entire essence of your new AI-powered pharmaceutical startup and the funding opportunity in one line, but have you tried? In our case, including the entire request in the subject line and capitalizing the proposed headline for readability did the trick. (PLEASE: NEVER SEND A SUBJECT LINE IN ALL CAPS.) 

3. Be direct

We chose “can” over “could,” even though, in retrospect, “will” is actually the word we meant. We opted for the polite touch with “pls.,” which I’m OK with abbreviating. It’s worth four characters. And the request itself couldn’t be more to the point: Share 3 Tips to Manage Your Inbox. 

And what about that notation at the end of the line? stands for “end of message.” It can signal to the reader that there’s no need for a response, but in this context–posing a question–it was intended to signal he didn’t have to open the message to read further.

If everyone followed these tips when drafting emails, maybe I’d be able to chisel away at my inbox. 

Which brings us back to Cuban’s actual tips for managing his inbox. As you’ll see, they’re pretty good. .

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