Email has become an essential of modern business; instant, free communication with anywhere in the world sitting on your desk, most people have trouble remembering how they got on with just fax machines, phones or letters it has become such a useful tool for all aspects of work.
In spite of its popularity, e-mail is still little understood and many businesses still float along thinking any old free e-mail like Hotmail or BTOpenworld is fine. Unfortunately, just like every other form of communication email has picked up a range of etiquette rules and preferences which can easily make you come across as unprofessional.
It’s all in the name
One of the most important things is getting the right e-mail address, Gmail just won’t do for you main business e-mail, everyone knows it’s a free web based e-mail program and that basically suggests you can’t be bothered to sort out a proper one; a bit like not having a company letterhead. Emails come bundled with your website domain name (www.yourwebsite.com), once you own a domain you can easily set up email accounts on it, even if you don’t need a website you can still buy a domain name for £10-20 just to run your email through.
Once you have the domain you will also need a web hosting or email hosting package, this basically rents you some space on an e-mail server, a huge bank of memory permanently connected to the Net to receive and send your e-mails. Almost all web designers are prepared to set this all up for you and many hosting packages come with user friendly interfaces if you want to try for yourself.
Email writing etiquette
Many people use email a bit like text messaging on a mobile phone, and that’s fine informally with friends, but when you contact someone on business many of the old letter writing rules apply. You don’t need an address in the corner but you do need to bother with “Dear…” and “Yours Sincerely” and so on. One of the biggest mistake is writing in capital letters, online caps symbolise shouting, so if you write everything in caps lock the reader may think you’re angry with them when you’re really not.
Email stationery
As it becomes more widely compatible email stationery is becoming popular, turning emails into typical letterheads with a company logo at the top and detailed autosignature with contact details at the bottom. When properly set up this can look very professional and like you really care about the company image and it’s something many web designers will do for you as well.
Email really is the ultimate communication medium of modern business, for some it is a little impersonal but most of the time it’s ability to easily transfer images, video, audio, documents and presentations around the globe in seconds is a godsend and making sure you use it right is important whether you’re dealing with major corporations or the general public.
