{"id":5794,"date":"2013-05-24T10:28:22","date_gmt":"2013-05-24T00:28:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wordconstructions.com.au\/blog\/?p=5794"},"modified":"2016-02-23T16:18:30","modified_gmt":"2016-02-23T05:18:30","slug":"hiding-email-addresses-leaves-a-sour-taste","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.wordconstructions.com.au\/blog\/2013\/05\/hiding-email-addresses-leaves-a-sour-taste\/","title":{"rendered":"Hiding email addresses leaves a sour taste"},"content":{"rendered":"

Do you think email addresses<\/a> should be hidden\u00a0or open to your clients or members?<\/p>\n

\"email<\/a>

A business making it hard for customers to email them just doesn’t make much business sense to me. Yet that’s exactly what one organisation is doing to their members…<\/p><\/div>\n

Today, I received an email from an organisation I’m a member of. {Disclaimer – I am only a member there because I haven’t made the time to move elsewhere – that time is now a high priority.}<\/p>\n

Replying to emails<\/h2>\n

I did not like today’s email – I mean it was\u00a0laid out ok and was polite and appropriate as far as the wording went, but I am not happy with the content. Largely because it showed that organisation is using member\u00a0money to fund something\u00a0completely unrelated, public and providing no obvious\u00a0benefit to members.<\/p>\n

I hit reply to tell them what I think. I doubt my voice will make a huge difference but I would feel better to be honest about it<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

However, the email comes from a no-reply address.<\/p>\n

Instead, I went to their website to grab their email address to use instead, but they only have an online form. So I even went as far as checking some letters they’ve sent me in the past – also the contact form URL instead of an email address.<\/p>\n

So I can’t reply to the email.<\/p>\n

And I am left feeling they are hiding from members. Feeling they are hiding from complaints. Feeling a bit uncomfortable and like I’ve touched something dirty\u00a0with the way they are keeping contact details secret.<\/p>\n

Selective email address use<\/h2>\n

Spam is awful – I hate it<\/a>. So like many others I avoid putting my email address online in a way that spam bots can find it.<\/p>\n

Yet that doesn’t mean my email address is hidden completely.<\/strong><\/p>\n

It is on my business cards, letterhead and certainly is the ‘reply to’ address for my html newsletter<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Other organisations put their email address on their site as a graphic – bots being unable\u00a0to read graphics (well, so far anyway!) – or in words (eg write AT wordconstructionsDOTcomDOTau is an acceptable way for me to share my email address online.)<\/p>\n

And it’s not like I’m talking about a small organisation that can’t cope with emails – a sole\u00a0trader or other SMB may need to manage contact options, but a big business has more staff and even dedicated staff for customer service.<\/p>\n

Is limited promotion the same as hiding?<\/h2>\n

What do you think?<\/p>\n

Are they protecting themselves from spam or from complaints? Are they hiding their email address, even from members, or is it a reasonable business decision?<\/p>\n

And I’d love to hear what you have done to promote or hide your email address<\/strong>, too.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Do you think email addresses should be hidden\u00a0or open to your clients or members? Today, I received an email from an organisation I’m a member of. {Disclaimer – I am only a member there because I haven’t made the time to move elsewhere – that time is now a high priority.} Replying to emails I […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1425,53],"tags":[1632,222,1630,1631,1351],"class_list":["post-5794","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-business-communications","category-business-info-tools","tag-complaints","tag-email","tag-hiding","tag-member","tag-reply"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t