Just curious. If you are contacted through your website from people with email address that end in Hotmail, Gmail, Yahoo, etc., the free ones. Do you take the requests seriously?

I've been getting emails from people with addresses at those accounts and ignore them - even if they are requesting info on my services. I feel if someone is a serious business person they will either have their own domain name or have their email address attached to an ISP (for example, here we have Cogeco and Rogers). It's so easy to get one of these free accounts that I don't think there is any accountabilty and if they ares serious, why are they hiding behind those anonymous accounts.

How do you handle these?

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Julia

Hi Julia -
I take those serious. Most of my clients have the free accounts, along with their business accounts. One of my clients is in the IT business so all of his tech's can view his emails if wanted. I take care of his personal business and rental houses and we conversate through his gmail account instead of his email through his company. Another client is a financial coach and she uses a hotmail account, for us to communicate and for me to schedule her clients with the hotmail calendar, she says it's easier to use than her domain email. I have one client that also has an on-site assistant, and even though we usually collaborate, there are issues the client likes to discuss privately through a personal email account. Although they all have their own domain and email address through their business.

That's why I take those serious! Hope that helps you some

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Kena~
Everyone smiles in the same language

I know more and more people, perfectly legitimate and serious people, using these - especially Gmail. Myself included. In fact I have more than one - I use them for different areas of my life - to keep things in better order.

One of my main reasons (and many other people I know as well) is that when you change service providers (or your domain name), your email ID changes as well, and you now have to advise everyone who had that old email ID. And you have to change all the sites that you signed up on with that email ID. And you have to change your own site and your business cards and any adversiting/affiliate stuff, and, and, and... With a Gmail account, I can change service providers, but it doesn't affect my email ID.

Regarding hiding behind these email IDs, there could be some, but you're probably missing some very legimate people by ignoring all of them. If they have some crazy email ID, I probably wouldn't take it seriously though.

I would have to say that I'm a bit learier of Hotmail and Yahoo IDs. I've worked in businesses that block any Hotmail or Yahoo email ID - just because there is so much spam coming out of there. So I'm not sure why people would want to use those any more - unless they don't realize they are being blocked in many places.

I'm rambling now. Signing off...
Deb

I don't generally worry too much about the email address because the content of the email generally lets me know if it's worth pursuing or not. Like the others, I also have several clients that use gmail and googlemail accounts but no hotmail accounts yet.

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Shari Sultana
Online Business Manager (marketing for retail ecommerce)

Good points all. Gmail may be a bit more legitimate and I have clients who have Gmail accounts but only use them if they are having issues with their regular email system. I also agree with using Gmail for websites where you registered your email address, but for business use, I wouldn't use any address about my domain name address. I am in the process of re-branding, but I'm keeping my old website for at least one year and domain name for the reasons you mentioned above. I'm currently using my new email address and getting people used to it. It's kind of like moving your house. You have your mail redirected for a few months and let people know that you've moved.

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Julia

Many people prefer to use gmail becuase they set up their pop email accounts on there and can view emails from everywhere (both old and new).

If you do it with your internet service provider and use outlook you can't view your downloaded emails if you are checking from anohter email. Only new emails coming through can be viewed.

You can get log me in or go to my/your pc but then you have to keep your computer on at all times and I do not suggest leaving the hosue for long periods of time with your computer on.

You don't want it to overheat and set on fire Doesn't happen often but anything is possible.

Re remote access for email - many web hosting companies provide a remote web mail service. When I am away from my office for extended periods of time, and I have web (or wireless access for my Palm), I can access my oakaa.com or primeadmin.com email remotely with the webmail program.

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Julia

I communicate with many people who have yahoo, gmal and hotmail accounts, and they are all legitimate. I use my yahoo account instead of my ISP account so I won't have to worry about changing my email address. For my yahoo account, I pay $20/year for extra services that aren't available with the free yahoo account.

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VirtuallyDee

I pay attention to all email accounts regardless of the domain. I'm leery of those accounts that are set up as 'hotmomma@yahoo.com' or 'slickchick@gmail.com' for example...those are the ones I tend not to give great credence to. Otherwise, free accounts are used by legitimate people, me included!

Jan

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New VAs: I personally recommend Become A Virtual Assistant to Get Started!

I agree here with the others. I have a few clients who are small business and use gmail or live accounts for communication purposes. Some clients would rather send through personal accounts so that communication does not get lost on their business emails. I even have one client who uses his domain email for "business" purposes but his gmail account for all other transactions.

My rule of thumb is if it looks like SPAM - delete it. If not sure open it up and judge by the content. Most legits will sign free email with name and company and you can check them out from there.

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Lee Drozak
My Office Assistant

I trust them... except for the hotmomma sounding ones. With my day job, I am involved with many entrepreneurs and business owners who use them as well. I agree with Lee and her opening of the mail policy. If there are things to download, and it looks weary, don't download it. Also some people use them because the server there other email is on may have a size limit which can be too small.

I am the secretary of two network meetings which means that I have everyones email addresses. Quite a few of them have these types of accounts. Especially the ones that do not have a website yet or that do not plan to have one but they need to have an email address.

My recommendation is to Google the email address if you are questioning the address. I google almost every address first to make sure that they are not scams. If Google does not come up with anything then I usually respond.

I have been receiving emails from "Managers" of UPS telling me that my package was not delivered because of my address and to download the attached invoice and bring it to UPS (the email address was ...@UPS.com). I went on to UPS' site and tracked the package number and it did not exist, then I called UPS and they said that they have been getting a lot of these calls and gave me an email address to forward the messages to.

It is actually easy to create an email account that uses a business name that does not exist.

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Erika Glem
www.advadminsol.com Let my administrative solutions be to your advantage.