If you build your own email list and it contains people who have done business with you in past, that can be an extremely effective marketing tool. Someone who has done business with you in past, is more likely to use you again if your product or service was up to expectations.

With ongoing wave of email viruses going around, people are becoming more and more reluctant to open email from strangers. If there is an attachment that could very well contain a virus. The only attachments that are normally safe to open are text files, i.e. ending with a "txt" extension, and images - "gif" - "jpg". But be very sure that extension does not end in vbs such as - jpg.vbs. Malicious hackers might try to fool you into thinking it is a safe file, but if it has a vbs extension, it very well might not.

With that in mind, here are some highly effective methods to get your advertisement read:

Don't use a phony email address that looks like gibberish or appears to be coded such as 14sTTy@yourdomain.com - this is a dead giveaway of spam and will be summarily deleted by most people.

Don't use "URGENT" or "Re: Here's information you requested" as subject if they didn't actually request information from you. Many people use filters to automatically put emails with these subjects in their "trash Bin".

Don't use an email address such as friend@anydomain.com or addressed to friend@mydomain.com. I don't know about you, but I don't know anyone with name of "friend", and I don't know anyone (nor care to) who calls me "friend".

PR: Ouch! Tells Tale

Ever get feeling that your public relations program isn’t doing much about behaviors of your important outside audiences? Those audiences whose actions have greatest impacts on your business?

Chances are your PR effort is focused primarily on communi- cations tactics and not on process needed to really move those key audience perceptions, and thus behaviors in your direction.

Which means you’ve missed out on sweet spot of public relations.

Ouch!

That sweet spot can be summed up in just two sentences:

People act on their own perception of facts before them, which leads to predictable behaviors about which something can be done. When we create, change or reinforce that opinion by reaching, persuading and moving-to-desired- action those people whose behaviors affect organization, public relations mission is accomplished.

Now there’s nothing wrong with communications tactics. They are necessary “beasts of burden” that fit in nicely at proper time, as you will shortly note.

So, if you believe it finally may be time to utilize that PR sweet spot, you could start this way.

Just who are your most important outside audiences? Customers and prospects, of course. But what about employees, minorities, residents, political and labor union leaders, trade and business communities, among others?

Rank them in order of importance to your operation and let’s work on your #1 external target audience.

Nothing can happen until you know what members of that audience think about your organization. And that means interacting with them while asking lots of probing questions and monitoring their perceptions. Have they heard about your company, its products or services? What do they think about them? Do you detect negativity, inaccuracies, misconceptions or even disturbing rumors?