An email costs nothing to send, which is exactly why it carries so little weight when it lands. A card costs a stamp, an address, and five minutes of handwriting, and the recipient can feel every one of those costs when they open it. Larry Chiang’s SuperModel idea is mostly about presence: dressing deliberately, keeping a pen in hand, taking visible notes, and none of that translates to a typed message.
The same pen that sits in his hand during a meeting is the pen that writes the card afterward, the physical habit does not stop when the meeting ends. Larry credits a specific thank-you note, not a follow-up email, with landing Nike as a sponsor, and he tells that story on purpose. An email sits in a folder with forty other emails from that same week, a card sits on a desk where someone sees it every day.
Karma, in his framework, rewards speed, and a card moves faster than an email in the way that actually matters: it demands to be noticed. Reciprocating fast is part of the same logic, a card mailed the same day says the relationship mattered before the ink was even dry.
None of this means email has no use, it is fine for scheduling and logistics, it is just the wrong tool for the moment you want to be remembered. A card also forces you to be specific, since you cannot fit a vague paragraph on it the way you can pad out an email.
That specificity is what makes the recipient believe you were paying attention instead of running a template. Send the email to confirm the meeting, then send the card to make sure they remember who you are afterward.
Details: Watch Larry on the card vs email call
#HandwrittenNotes #FollowUp #Web12