You know your Web site, your business cards and your collateral are marketing tools, but what about your e-mail? I’m not talking about e-newsletter; I’m talking about day-to-day e-mailing. Here are a few things to consider:
1. Your e-mail address. Are you using an AOL or Hotmail address? If you’re trying to present yourself as a professional, consider your own domain name and an address that utilizes it.
2. How your name appears. Send yourself a test message. Does just your first name show up in a recipient’s inbox? Is it all lowercase? These are things you can fix to make sure you present yourself as professionally as possible.
3. Your signature line. Don’t forget to include a signature that includes your Web site address and phone number — resources that people find helpful when easily accessible. Plus, consider linking out to your Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn pages. When you do this, you’ll probably notice the increase in hits and followers. You might also want to add your logo to your signature for visual appeal.
Let’s not forget minding our Ps and Qs when writing e-mail. I’m sure most of us have been guilty of this more than once. We hammer out a quick message to a friend, coworker, client, or whoever it may be. We might leave out some punctuation, use txt speak, or otherwise get lazy in some way. Or worse, write something that could be considered derogatory to any other person besides who we’re sending this to. And then it happens: that message gets forwarded around the block a few times, and your dirty laundry is aired. Your professionalism just took a HUGE hit.
We can’t control what happens to the message once we send it, but we CAN control the message we are sending. It’s well worth the extra seconds needed to re-read and ensure we’re not setting ourselves up for failure.
Another helpful post, thank you AVC!!