If you market your business online
you likely spend a lot of time communicating with customers and
prospects via e-mail. You may also spend time networking on message
boards and other online groups. Here are a few tips to help save
time and to help make sure the message you want to send is the
message that is received.
1. Use meaningful subject lines.
You want to convey the content of the message.
Make sure your subject line is as specific as it can be in a few
words. “I have a question” doesn’t offer any
clue to the content, but “question about shipping”
does. You may think that the subject line isn’t that important
since your question will be in the message, but a recipient who
may receive a hundred emails a day will prioritize by subject
line and the more specific subjects will likely be read first.
You also want to choose email subject lines that
are less likely to be blocked by a spam filter. Avoid spam filter
trigger words like “free,” “info you requested,”
and “save”.
When posting on message boards and news groups
you want your subject line to attract the people who can answer
your question or who are interested in the topic. Many message
board participants have limited time and they only open the topics
of interest. If your subject line simply reads, “help me”
the experts may skip over it. But “need help with search
engine optimization” will likely get the attention of someone
with more experience on the topic.
Don’t change the subject line in your reply
unless you are completely changing the topic of the message.
2. Your message should be concise, but complete.
Get to your point early in your message and make sure you provide
all the necessary information.
Some people still pay an hourly rate for Internet
access and others are limited in the amount of information they
can download. Unnecessarily long messages may be ignored or deleted
by those individuals and unnecessarily long email messages add
to an already overburdened email system.
By providing complete information in your first
message you can often get your request taken care of right away.
For example, if you email a website to ask for a change to your
ad or your reciprocal link, don’t just ask, “how can
I change my ad,” but include the changes you want to make.
Often, changes are made by email so if you include the information
in your first email the change will be made right away.
3. When replying to e-mail, be sure to include
enough of the original message to convey the context of the reply.
The person you’re corresponding with may
receive hundreds of messages a week and your message will be answered
sooner and more accurately if the rest of the correspondence is
included.
An exception should be made when you’ve
written back and forth quite a few times and the email message
starts to get very large. In that case, delete some of the earlier
messages that are no longer necessary. Additionally, if you are
emailing a newsgroup that offers daily “digest” be
sure to remove most of the original message. It becomes very difficult
to read the digest when every response includes the entire original
message.
On threaded message boards it’s not necessary
to quote the original post in your reply as most visitors are
following along the entire thread and know the context. Use a
quoted reply only to highlight and refer to a particular section
of the original.
4. When sending e-mail to multiple recipients,
be sure to use the blind CC address line. Do not reveal all the
e-mail addresses to all the recipients.
In most cases you shouldn’t be sending messages
to multiple recipients unless it’s a mailing list (in which
case you should be using a mailing list program that individually
addresses the messages to your list). But if you sometimes find
the need to send one message to multiple recipients, be extremely
careful to use the blind CC. Leaving everyone’s email address
visible to all the recipients will anger many and lead the rest
to mistrust that you’ll safeguard any of their personal
information.
5. Make sure your business email can get through
to you.
In your effort to reduce the amount of spam you
receive, make sure your aren’t eliminating business email.
Avoid e-mail accounts that filter spam for and find your own effective
spam filter that lets you decide what is and isn’t spam.
You need to make sure your business email gets through. In many
cases your ISP email or one of the popular free email services
will likely be heavily filtered at the server. If you don’t
have a website that includes several email addresses consider
purchasing another domain name and hosting service for your business
email and make sure the hosting company allows you to turn off
all filtering at the server level.
Those are just a few tips to help you communicate
more efficiently online. If you’re new to the Internet you’ll
want to do a little research on “netiquette.” You’ll
find tips about online shorthand and emoticons (icons that indicate
expressions like smiling and frowning), information on “flaming”
(angry or insulting personal attacks), and simple conventions
like typing in all caps is considered shouting.
Communicating online is very different from communicating
in person. With just a little effort your online communication
can become efficient and effective.
Article by:
Linda Stacy owns and manages a unique service
connecting network marketing business owners with potential team
members through instant online chats. Visit
iRepNetwork.com for tips and tools to help you generate leads
and build your team. www.irepnetwork.com
