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Articles by Cathy Fothergill

To follow are some of the original articles by Cathy Fothergill . You may use them in your double opt-in ezine or on your web site under the following conditions: 1. Do not change the content. 2. Include my resource box. 3. Your web site must display clear ownership information. 4 You may not redistribute this as part of another "free content" list or web site. 5. You may not charge a fee for reading these articles.

9 Keys to Email Survival

I was once an internet rookie. So I DO understand the carefree attitude that comes with the discovery of email. Because of that carefree attitude, I made a lot of crucial mistakes in the beginning. One of those mistakes resulted in lots and lots of unsolicited bulk email coming to me, my friends and family. (See #3). Some of these mistakes also could have caused my friends and family to receive viruses and Trojans.

The good news is that I survived those early days and so can you. If you're new to email, please learn from my (and others') mistakes and implement the following email practices.

1. Identify Yourself: Set up your email program to clearly identify who you are without the receiver having to open the email. If you are sending email to someone you don't know very well, be sure you place something in the subject line that would serve as a memory jogger.

2. Use a subject line that is short and to the point: Tell the receiver what you are sending. Don't use greetings, i.e. "Hi!" in subject lines . If you are sending a poem, say so. If you are not specific, your email may be mistakenly deleted.

3. Learn to use "blind carbon copy" or "BCC": If you send an email to multiple names in your address book using the "CC" function, these email addresses are visible to everyone receiving the email. They are also visible to everyone receiving the email through forwarding. The problem with this is that by the time an email is sent to the lists of several different people, all of those email addresses have probably fallen into the hands of a spammer. Sending an email to several recipients without using BCC is like giving the email addresses of all your friends and family to a mailing list company, because that is where they will go. You would never do that on purpose, would you? (If you want your recipients to know who else got your email, use the CC method that is found in printed letters)

4. Use caution when forwarding: If you receive an email that you simply MUST share, resist the urge to just hit the FWD button. Instead, hit the FWD and then erase everything except the information you want to forward. Be sure you also erase any email addresses that may have been included by someone who didn't know how to use blind carbon copy. A better practice would be to copy the information you'd like to share into a blank, fresh email.

5. Whenever possible, don't send attachments: Again, if you run across something you must share, copy it into another email instead of just forwarding it. Forwarding almost always converts the original files into attachments. Also, if you must send an attachment, place something in the subject line of the email that will tell the receiver that your email contains an attachment. As a general rule, most email veterans will not open emails that contain attachments, due to the number of viruses that spread through the use of attachments…even if they come from a good friend.

6. Don't pass petitions: Email petitions are not given any credence by any governing body. Signing them and passing them on is a waste of your (and everyone else's) time.

7. Don't pass on "true stories": If someone sends you something "true" that you feel needs the attention of your friends and family, go to http://www.snopes.com and do a search to see if the information is there. The site is a great resource to help you determine whether something is the truth or a hoax. Good examples of hoaxes that circulate the internet as "truth" are: The Madelyn Murray O'Hare RM-2493, The Proctor and Gamble, Satanism and any email that claims you will be paid for forwarding an email.

8. Don't send chain letters: These are just as offensive (and potentially illegal) online as they are in their postal versions. (Any email that instructs me to "send this to 10 of your friends" ends up in my trash.)

9. Don't bombard people with "stuff": Most people don't mind an occasional email that contains a nice poem, a cute story or a funny photo. However, if you wish to send this type of communication to your friends and family, do so in moderation. What if everyone on your email list sent you 15 "cute" things a day? You wouldn't have time to do anything else, would you?

If you follow these simple guidelines, you're in a great position to survive the email environment. Your friends and family will thank you.

**Article by: Cathy Fothergill, Copyright 2006. First published, The Article Connection Update, 10/27/06. Do you write articles? Great! Webmasters and ezine publishers are just dying to hear what you have to say. Get on over to: http://www.connectionteam.com and start submitting.

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