Is there anybody there?

Isn’t the internet a wonderful thing?

It’s revolutionised the way we get information, the way we buy things, the way we do business, the way we communicate – even the way we find our soulmate.

According to the Royal Pingdom blog site (See? Clever use of the internet again).

• 107 trillion  emails were sent on the Internet in 2010.
•  The average number of email messages per day was 294 billion,  and there were
• 1.88 billion email users worldwide.

‘Seems like email is taking over the world, and definitely affecting how we talk to our clients – but it’s not all soft lights and sweet music, you know.

Ask yourself, how quickly do you respond to emails from your clients, suppliers, contacts? How do you use your emails to remind those people how good your business is, and why they should use it?

And, conversely, how much better might it have been if you just picked up the phone and talked to them?

For many of us, using the internet is like dancing wildly or picking our nose in the car. We think we’re invisible and that everything is perfectly ok.

Whilst we’re happily getting on with our business there’s bound to be someone out there saying “They never respond to my emails”, or “An acknowledgment of that information I shared with them might be nice. Perhaps I just went into their spam box”.

So, beware the internet – when it’s good it’s great, when it’s bad it’s horrid.

• Check your spam regularly for that all important email you might have missed
• Be courteous, and reply to your emails, or if you really can’t, an automatic reply is better than nothing
• Think about how you use email – is it promoting your business for you and encouraging contact?
• Could you actually talk to your clients, contacts or suppliers and make them feel more important?

As I said, the internet is a wonderful thing – but sometimes it can be just like opening your mouth and putting your foot in it, or not opening your mouth at all.

And as Christmas approaches, think twice before you send that E-card.

You never know, there might actually be someone out there who wants to talk to you.