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Moving communication campaigns into action |
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Best practice for business emails Here is a back issue of Marketing Booster, the email newsletter that Richard Groom writes and sends free every fortnight to subscribers. You can subscribe here or read over 60 back issues using the back issues index page. This edition isn't about any clever mass marketing programmes using emails. (Sorry if that's what you were hoping for.) But it is about something just as important: the use of emails in day-to-day business correspondence. Why is that relevant for marketers? Because whether your organisation provides services or products the role of people in your organisation is crucial. It's people who by and large build or destroy trust and credibility among customers and others. And the way they communicate with the outside world has a big impact on whether they build trust and credibility. Have you ever been attracted by the advertising, direct mail exhibitions or other efforts of a company, only to find that the way they communicate with you by email is the deciding factor in your purchase decision? And yet I have rarely seen marketing departments get involved in steering the way that their organisation's staff use email. A few years ago the subject of 'netiquette' - good manners in the use of email - was something of a hot topic. I don't want to repeat all of the netiquette tips: you can find them on the internet if you wish. Instead I want to take some time to think about how we communicate by email and its role in an integrated marketing strategy. Take spelling and grammar for example. When we send an email in connection with our job we are representing our organisation. If our email is full of spelling or grammar errors it could reflect on our whole organisation. Do you want to buy something from a company whose people can't even spell? The success of the book "Eats, Shoots and Leaves" shows that millions of people still care about spelling and grammar. So there's a good chance that lots of our customers will too. On a similar note, it's fine to slip into quickly-typed messages full of abbreviations and 'text speak' when emailing friends, but it's best avoided when sending business emails. Often, we don't know the person we are writing to well enough to take a risk about formality versus informality. (Personally, I tend to address emails to people I am writing to for the first time with 'Dear' or 'Hello' instead of 'Hi'.) Another issue that I for one find a problem is that of being able to call people who send me emails. When we send letters we always include our phone number so that people can reply. So why do so many people forget to include their phone number on their emails? It can be frustrating when you want to call someone to discuss their email but you can't find their number. If nothing else, surely making yourself easy to contact is a 'must do' marketing technique. And finally, remember that the main rules for sending business emails in Europe come from the Privacy and Electronic Communications (EC Directive) Regulations 2004. In summary, the rules say that your business cannot send unsolicited emails to private individuals unless they have given their consent. Also, whether your email is to a business or an individual, you must always identify yourself as the sender and include instructions about how recipients can opt out of future emails. If your organisation hasn't applied these regulations in your email policy then now's the time to do it. To sum up then, it strikes me as just a little odd that organisations spend millions sending staff on telephone techniques courses but often take little time or care to make sure staff are using email in a consistent, professional and customer-focused way. Copyright 2005 Richard Groom |