This is tough love week when it comes to all-things-internet. On Tuesday, I really held your feet to the fire about who has their fingers in your store’s online presence. More than a couple of you went into damage control mode immediately (based on emails landing in my inbox right after the post landed).
Today, my friends, we’re going to take a look at that email address of yours…and get honest about what it says before you even begin typing a message beneath it. Make no mistake; what falls ahead of the @ symbol is as important as what follows it.
Not unlike a handshake that sets a first impression, your email address is the first impression customers get of you and your business. Whether seeing it listed on your website or receiving it on an email, what follows the @ symbol announces one of two things:
Using @yourwebsite.com says:
“Hello there, I’m a professional.”
Using @aol.com, @yahoo.com, @gmail.com, @yourcablecompany.com, or another not-your-website option says one of three things:
“Hello, I own a business and a website but am too lazy to set up a real business email address,”
“I haven’t bothered with a web presence and am using personal email to slide by,” or worse,
“Whatever…here’s my email.”
And, forgive me for saying this out loud, but YourStore@so-and-so-dot-com is not a solution.
Did that sound harsh? Sorry. Didn’t intend to. But the reality is simple. You wouldn’t slap a piece of mat board with your logo drawn in magic marker on the wall in lieu of a storefront sign, so why are you using the digital equivalent of that for your email?
The solution is simple.
If you have a website
Well, you get zero sympathy on this one, unless you’ve either hired a half-speed web designer (go back and read Tuesday’s post) or are learning your way through setting up your own site. See, once you own a domain name and have a host, you also have access to email accounts branded to match (@YourStoreSite.com). There’s zero reason not to be using them.
Log into your cPanel and set these puppies up, or call your web designer and tell him/her to get cracking. This is Website 101 stuff that any designer worth a buck-fifty should have set up the very first day-—do not let them finagle you into paying additional fees to do this after the fact (if they try, ask them why the heck they didn’t set these up to begin with).
If you don’t own a website
Oooh, we need to talk. Are you trying to be invisible? Just asking.
Even if you intend to defy logic, using email to connect with customers who clearly are using their computers, you still need a “grown up” email address. At the very least, you need to register a domain name that ties to your business, then set up email accounts behind it. Yes, that means paying for a host contract, since that’s where email access comes from (please please please please please do not succumb to GoDaddy’s add-on email options…you need customer support even more than someone who’s web-savvy). If you go with someone like In Motion Hosting, you can slide into a starter account very affordably and get fantastic customer service with folks who not only reside in the US but speak full blown English.
(Then think long and hard about at least putting a single page up on your site that acts as a billboard for your store, including your address and phone number. Costs less per year than a Yellow Pages ad….and reaches, oh, like a bazillion more people.)
What’s before the @?
This part applies to everyone.
Over the course of time, I’ve learned a fair bit about how various spammers come up with their mailing lists. Not surprisingly, most shoot for the easiest and most obvious targets-—email addresses that begin with info@, sales@, customerservice@, and newsletter@. After all, most businesses have at least one of those.
To trim back the likelihood your email addresses will become favorites of the spamming community, use multi-word alternatives like ask_a_question@ instead of info@, sales_dept@ instead of sales@, customer_assist@ instead of customerservice@, and the_latest_news@ instead of newsletter@. Most spammers won’t take the time or make the effort to move into anything that requires hyphens or underscores. Too much hassle, too many options.
It’s all about you, after all.
Don’t forget that in the end, this is all about making customers in front of their computers see your business as one that’s current, successful, and stable. Why give them a poster board sign when you can hand them a business card instead?
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If someone wants to take baby steps, another alternative is to at the least have a forwarder set up from your domain address to your aol/gmail/yahoo address. You can keep your address but still use a professional email address.