What is CC? An Overview

Every individual or organization involved in communication of any kind must understand the multi-use of the terms “BCC”, “TO”, and “CC”. When sending emails, these terms are imperative to understanding the purpose of the correspondence. All three of those commonly used terms are ‘Carbon Copy’ abbreviated as ‘CC’.

However, the letter ‘C’ in this context does not stand for ‘Copy’ as most people interpret it to mean, it actually stands for ‘Carbon.’ Carbon copies are traditionally thought to be a physical document copy. Every other copy was made from the original source (the master copy) by pressing a carbon paper in between the original and each subsequent copy. The carbon paper would transfer the ink or lead on the original document to the other document copies leaving a faint image of the details that were on the master copy.

Today, a ‘Carbon Copy’ is now predominantly defined as the unaltered carbon copy of an email or its attachments sent to multiple users – unlike a ‘Broadcast Copy’, which is a blind copy of the email sent to multiple users.

What Is CC in Email?

In email communication, ‘CC’ stands for ‘Carbon Copy,’ an email industry terms which signifies the secondary recipient of an email message. This acronym is used to denote the recipient of an email who is receiving a copy of the message.

When a message is sent to multiple recipients using the ‘CC’ option, each of the recipients will be aware of who else has received the mail. The primary advantage of using ‘CC’ to send emails is that you can send both the primary and any secondary recipients a single email with the same content rather than creating separate emails for each recipient.

Using CC option, when the main intended recipient gets the message, he/she can easily preview the list of those to whom the message has been sent.

One important thing to remember when using the ‘CC’ option is that you must use it in moderation, as sending emails to too many recipients can cause it to get lost in a flood of emails.

How to Use CC

Whether you are sending an email or making a physical copy of a document, it’s important to understand when and how to use the ‘CC’ option. For example, you should consider using ‘CC’ when –

• You want to ensure that all recipients of the same email can view the email’s content, the sender, and each of the other recipients.

• You are sending a reply to an email thread and want to include those who have been involved in the thread before.

• You are sending a copy of the same email to a few different people and want them all to know who else has received the email.

• You want to keep tabs on who has received particular emails in the future, in case a response is received or not.

Conclusion

The best thing about using CC is that it enables you to quickly and easily send messages to multiple people at once, in a manner that is easily readable by all of them. Plus, if you ever need to reference who was sent an email and for what purpose, you will have a complete record of all recipients stored in the CC field.