If you own a website and email your users or send out newsletters, remember that people use email more than Search or any other online activity, and much of this time is already wasted on filtering out unsolicited email, or “spam.” The result is that receiving additional email messages, even from a fascinating non-spammer such as yourself, may be less a cause for celebration than it might have been in the pre spam era.
Working with email in a usable way is largely about meeting people’s expectations. Every time you email someone, you create a little user experience for them. By this point, every internet user has developed their own definition of email usability. So it’s best to keep things simple and avoid surprises.
Sending Email to Your Users
Even if you have a small website and are not sending out large email campaigns, it’s best to follow some simple conventions, to prevent your email messages from resembling spam in anyway.
First, make sure your “From” field and subject line immediately communicates who you are and what the email is about. Similarly, in the body of the message, you’ll want to get to the point right away. Bad email design may cause users to fail in the simplest task: to figure out what this email is and why they’re receiving it. So this is not just a matter of style, and applies to cases where the reader has willingly requested the email, such as email newsletter.
Next, don’t forget to provide clear instructions right in the message body for how to unsubscribe from your email.
Adding an “Email Me” Feature to Your Website
Every website should offer a way to contact its author. Of course, the best approach is to allow users to submit messages via a form interface. This allows users to keep their email anonymous if they wish (they may be worried about receiving even more spam).
Using a form also allows you, as the author of the site, to manage the incoming email in a more usable way. For example, if you have lots of traffic, you can ask users to specify the nature of their message, then route it accordingly. Using a form also allows you to steer clear of the automated programs spammers use to collect email address, in the hopes of becoming your pen-pal from hell.
Still Want to Reveal Your Email Address?
It’s a shame that we can no longer safely display email hyperlinks (or “mailto:” online without receiving a barrage of spam. It was a more intimate and efficient way to invite feedback from readers while communicating the identity of the website’s author.
But let’s say you have a small audience and you still want to use one of these powerful little hyperlinks. In that case, make sure to use the @symbol because this tells users that clicking on the link will launch their email software (or web-based email). Don’t hide the “mailto:” in an innocent looking link with no “@” symbol.
Another solution is to reveal your email address but don’t make it a mailto link, and require users to do a bit of extra work. For example, you can display your address in an image. It’s not as usable because users will not be able to click it or even copy and paste it, but it will help keep you off the spammer’s lists.