INL – News

 By CWinslow

Reaching out and touching someone with email is for sure an excellent source of communication, but know the rules if you are using a computer at work. Use email responsibly and don’t put anything in writing that you wouldn’t want forwarded.

In another article we talked about setting up email and filtering it. Today we will talk more about writing anad sending messages.

The problem with “send this email to everyone in your email box.”

If you have never been online before, then I have to tell you, you will be getting email that tells you something worse than “breaking a mirror will get you seven years of bad luck.” If you believe that, then I guess you will believe that not forwarding the email to everyone in your address book is going to … It won’t and no one is going to come and confiscate your first born child either.

These types of email are not only a nusence, but they can be downright dangerous. A good many of these emails could be sent by malicious pranksters. Viruses can be attached to them but the worst thing is that they just glut Internet with useless traffic thus slowing down the entire Internet.

Snopes before you forward

If someone is sending you information about a virus or asking you to pay money to this or that check it out on snopes.com first to make sure it is a ligitimate problem before you forward it.

Secondly make sure that you have virus software that scans your email. My favorite scanner is AVG and is still Free. Yes, they do have a paid version but the free one does a great job.

Scams are very widespread on the Internet. If you did not request the information or you don’t know where it is coming from then just delete it. That is the one thing you can do. If no one ever responds to the crap mail, then one day it very well could slow it down.

When you subscribe to a newsletter, read the privacy policy you just might also be subscribing to other email lists that you have no knowledge of unless you read the small print.

 Using email in marketing

Using email in marketing is a great way to advertise, but when you do make sure that people are actually opting in for you to talk to them via email. All eMail autoresponder messages should be double optin. Email on demand, the Internets version of Fax on demand gives you a person’s email address. They are asking for one email and one email only. You could have another link in the email to get them to optin to an eCourse or series of messages, but don’t do it unless they specifically ask for the information.

What exactly is SPAM

SPAM is unrequested messages. If reported for SPAM you could lose your ISP and everything you have worked for so just don’t do it.

Many people will optin to a newsletter, then report you for SPAM so it is always a good idea to keep names, email address, from what IP, and a date they opted in. It won’t always get you out of hot water but just might save your butt one day.

 eMail is great and can be used for keeping in  touch and of course in your marketing efforts.

CWinslow is one of the founders of the Internet Niche Lab. She teaches three classes each week and invites members to ask questions and get almost instant answers during live presentations.