by Azam Corry
A signature file is a short paragraph of text that you place at the end of your email messages or any articles that you write. It should be about 5 or 6 lines long and contain your contact details with a brief summary of what you or your company offers.
The signature file offers you the best free advertising available anywhere on the internet and can be a very powerful tool if used correctly...
Thousands of people will read your signature file when you post to an email list or forum.
If you've written something interesting, there's a good chance that many of them will click on your link to find out more about you. Which leads me to another point... make sure you include the full URL with the 'http:// ' bit and start your email address with 'mailto:'
Why?
Because online and in most email programs links are "clickable," but only if written out in the full form. You'll loose many potential visitors or inquires if you force people to copy, paste and (in the case of an URL) add the missing information at the beginning.
Avoid lengthy signature files... people will take offence at a lengthy and blatant attempt to make money from your signature (bad netiquette!). Some may also refuse you public postings. Keep it short and to the point.
It should have:
1. Your name 2. Your company name 3. Your web site URL 4. Your email (or autoresponder) address 5. A very brief description of your web site, product or service.
You should end up with something like this:
Azam Corry
NowSell.com
http://www.NowSell.com
Making Money on the Internet.
No-nonsense, what-you-need-to-know help for YOUR success online.
mailto:demosig@nowsell.com
Keep your signature within 65 characters wide as this the maximum viewing width of some e-mail clients. If it's wider than this it may "break" onto the next line, taking up more space.
If you need more room for marketing punch - this is your ad, remember ;-) - drop your company name, don't increase the overall length!
Got a free offer?... this is a great place to advertise it. Just think of how many visitors you could get from an attractive free offer advertised at the end of your posting to a list with 5000 subscribers!
Create several different versions of your signature files using alternative wording. Use these to add relevancy to the medium in which you're posting when you promote each of your main products or services.
To aid in tracking the effectiveness of your marketing efforts you can also use different email addresses or aliases that correspond to the locations in which your file appears.
Use your signature file all the time in all the mail you send, including those letters sent out from your autoresponders (advertise a different product/service to that for which the automatic reply is generated). You should also use your signature file when posting to e-mail discussion groups, newsgroups, and message boards.
© 1999-2000 Azam Corry "Do it Better. Do it Faster. Do it Right!"
Online since 1998, Azam Corry Helps Newbies Develop a Winning
Web Marketing Strategy with Great Free Guides, Tools and Resources.
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You can reproduce this article free of charge anywhere you want, as long as you include the author information found at the end. Please do not make any substantial editorial changes without reviewing them with me prior to publication. Links within the article or resource box may not be altered, and must be 'clickable' on a web page or in an ebook.
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Click here for a plain text version, formated to 65 characters per line for easy copy and paste straight into your ezine.
