Archive for November, 2008

eMail Spam and the CAN-SPAM Act

November 28th, 2008 Gail

Welcome back! Get all my updates automatically when you subscribe to my RSS feed here.


Internet newbies may not be familiar with the CAN-SPAM Act that was put into law January 1, 2003.  Its purpose is to provide guidelines for website owners and businesses who use eMail to promote their products and services.  This law makes it mandatory for eMailers to provide a way for the recipient to ask them to stop sending eMails and to use only valid information in the subject line and in the body of the eMails that are sent.

Why am I writing about this?  Surely everyone is familiar with it – right?  Well, evidently not because I get complaints from new subscribers and customers about the number of eMails they received requiring confirmation.

The CAN-SPAM Act requires that we use a double opt-in whenever someone gives out their eMail address.  Even though a person has requested or subscribed through an eMail capture page, we are required to make sure the owner of the eMail address is the person that requested the information.  Anyone could have used their eMail address – therefore, we send them a link to confirm their request.  If we do not receive confirmation, we cannot send anything to them.

How can you tell the spammers from valid businesses?

That’s easy:

  • Spammers send you eMails that you did not request
  • Spammers do not ask you to confirm your request for information
  • Spammers mislead you into opening their eMail
  • Spammers don’t give you a way to stop receiving eMails from them
  • Spammers don’t use a valid physical postal address in their eMails

Any time you sign up for an offer on the Internet, expect to receive a confirmation eMail.  Once you confirm that it is from a website or person you know, it is OK to click on the confirmation link.  After clicking on the link, you will receive the information you requested.

Over the last year, I started seeing an increase in the number of people who sign up for information, but never confirm their request.  Recently, I have added a “Print this Page” button so they can print the instructions I display after a visitor has signed up for something.  I provide them with the eMail address the confirmation will be sent from so they don’t miss it.

In addition, I tell them to look in their junk/spam folder if they don’t find the confirmation in their eMail inbox.  Recently I became aware that some eMail providers automatically delete eMails they consider spam and therefore don’t provide you with a junk/spam folder.

Before you open an eMail from someone you don’t know, stop and think if you recently requested information.  If not, it’s best to just delete it!


Print This Post Print This Post

Posted in Internet Basics Tags: , 2 Comments »

Unique Ways to Use Customer Service Surveys

November 23rd, 2008 Gail

On the Internet, proper customer service is almost more important than offline.  That’s because you’re almost never working with a customer directly.  They are faceless people you will most likely never meet.  You don’t have a customer service department for them to call or walk into to report a problem.  Most likely, you’re using eMail, a contact form or a support desk.  These support issues are handled with some form of automation.

With automation comes a very unique set of problems.  If you’re not providing the correct response to a customer issue, it will escalate.  People need to feel you are talking directly to them, so even if you have canned responses, you need to find a way to personalize each and every one.

Unfortunately, many people become braver online than they are in the offline world.  That’s because they don’t have to face you.  They leave spam or other nasty comments on your blog and very demanding requests for a refund.  Don’t you just hate it when those refund requests come in and they don’t have the necessary information required to process the refund?

Use Surveys and Polls to Monitor Website Visitors

Just as you need to survey your customers that made a purchase, you should consider using an online survey tool to discover if your website visitors are finding what they were searching for on your site.

The Internet has a diverse pool of people developing digital products, selling affiliate products, building membership lists, Squidoo Lenses, Hub Pages, Blogs and much more.  In order to discover if you are giving visitors what they were searching for, you should be considering using customer and visitor surveys.  You may be getting traffic to your site, but they won’t do you any good if they were not looking for what you gave them.

You may think your site is visitor friendly… they may not!  The only way to find out how to improve the visitor experience is by asking them.

Improving the Customer Experience

Successful web sites and pages are continually tracked for traffic, clicks through to links and monetization.  If you’re not earning, it’s time to start surveying and polling your visitors.

Once you setup a survey or poll on your site, make sure it’s collecting feedback.  If not, you may need to move it to a more prominent place, like above the fold so visitors see it right away.  Sometimes an exit poll is effective when gathering specific information about the visitor’s experience.

You can do a Google search on “poll software” and “survey software.”  You’ll find many different options for website survey creators available from services you access online to software that downloads to your computer.

Here’s a FREE poll creator I developed that’s very easy to use.  This is an executable to install the software on your computer – just follow the directions and be sure to check the box to create a desktop icon:


Print This Post Print This Post

Posted in Customer Service Tips Tags: , , 1 Comment »

How to Crop and Resize Photos

November 22nd, 2008 Gail

If you have Microsoft Office Picture Manager on your computer, here’s a fast way to get the job done:

  • Open the software
  • Click on “Shortcuts” on the left side of the toolbar
  • Shortcuts has opened a new column on the left side of the page.  Search through the files and find the image you want to use.  Click on the folder where your image is stored and then double left click on the image.
  • On the toolbar, click on Edit Pictures

Cropping the Image

  • On the right column, click on Crop to remove excess size – you should only keep the important visuals in the image and get rid of excess border.  This will reduce the size of your image and the space needed to store it on your site.
  • Notice the “handles” that appear around your image.  Click on one to move the handle in – this will be your crop line.
  • Once you’re happy with the crop definition, click OK.

Reducing the Image Size

  • Click on Edit Pictures; Resize
  • Click on Percentage of Original Width x Height
  • Use the arrows to make the image larger or smaller
  • The normal width for an image in a blog post is 150 – 200 pixels wide.  As you use the arrows, keep your eye on the New Size under Size Setting Summary.
  • Once you are at the desired size click on OK.

Saving Your Image

Never save OVER the original file.  You never know when you will want to use the image again:

  • Click on File; Save As and give it a new file name.  Hint – I usually use the original file name and add “_r” to the end which tells me it’s a reduced image.  So…picture.jpg becomes picture_r.jpg.
  • Once the file is saved – you’re done!

Using Other Software

You can find just about anything on the Internet, but you need to be careful.  Many free software programs are filled with viruses to infect your computer or leave tracking devices to spy on your activity.  Make sure you are downloading and using reputable sites.

Many people are using Picnik because it offers a valued service with a good reputation.  They offer a lot of options such as the ability to crop, resize, rotate and they have special effects.  No download to install and works on Mac and Windows computers.  Check it out – all FREE.

Be sure to check out the extension Tools you can install for FireFox and Internet Explorer.  If you need additional assistance, use their forum to get tips and tricks from other users.

FREE Images

There are many royalty-free image sites online.  In fact, one of my favorites is BigStockPhoto.  Since originally finding and using BigStockPhoto, they have added more licensing terms…and I just got tired of spending money on images.

Then I found sites where you can download images FREE.  Morguefile contains all FREE images; the others have free sections, so be sure to locate them on the site:


Print This Post Print This Post

Posted in Internet Basics Tags: , , , 1 Comment »
« Older Entries