Now e-mail is a wonderful thing. Don't get me wrong, but unlike telephone or face to face communication, if you don't watch your words you can easily be mis-understood. It's all too easy to offend or even hurt someone's feelings just by what you type, even if that wasn't your intention at all.

Allow me to explain: When you're on phone, your voice sets stage for what you're trying to say. You raise your tone when angry and laugh or giggle when joking, so it's easy for other person to understand main focus of your message. When someone screams at you on telephone, you know immediately they're angry, that or they just forgot to take their Prozac that day.

Face to face communication is another way we converse. Your body positioning, facial expressions and tone all work together to get your message understood.

But, e-mail is different. You need to remember there is no voice tone, facial expression or body language, making it harder to get your message across way you intend. So next time you're in a hurry to respond to an e-mail keep following tips in mind:

1) If you say something in a message and don't want it taken too seriously, add a well-known acronym "LOL," which stands for "laughing out loud," or type "just kidding."

1) First and foremost, what is permission based or opt-in e-mail and how is it distinguished from Spam? Opt-in or permission based e-mail (the terms are interchangeable) means recipients have confirmed their interest in receiving e-mail and have signed up (hence term opt- in) to receive e-mail about a subject of their interest. The recipient may also unsubscribe from list at any time and all e- mail messages are clearly identified as coming from a specific and approved vendor or source.

2) We do not recommend Spam (unsolicited bulk e-mail messages) to our clients, nor have we ever developed a campaign that is not opt-in based – we think there is a growing backlash to Spam and many of us(author included) are inundated with it and delete it as soon as we recognize it.

3) The actual opt-in e-mail content is very important, like any interactive marketing process – subject itself needs to be succinct and informative, as this is how most people filter e-mail, text in message should be concise, with paragraphs no more than 2-3 short sentences, customer references should be referred to in lead paragraph to drive rest of message, have no more than two hyperlinks embedded in content and utilize a close and signature that thanks people for their time with a link (phone and e- mail) to a "real" person.

4) Many marketing types don't know whether to use HTML (rich media)or textual content – a standard rule of thumb is, if your target audience is consumers, then many prefer HTML format, due to snazzier graphical content; but, if your targeting corporate or technical types majority of them want a message that is text only and one that leaves out any/all marketing hype – just concise facts.