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EFFECTIVE USE OF SIGNATURES
by Rachel Goldstein
owner of Allfreelancework.com - 1000s of freelance jobs

Are you looking for an inexpensive way to promote your freelancing business? The email signature is a very powerful and reliable method of marketing your services … and FREE! Not only would I recommend the use of signatures, I am telling you that signatures are vital to the growth of your business.

What is a signature?

A signature is a few lines of text that are automatically added to the end of every outgoing email by your mail program (for ex. Outlook Express, Netscape Messenger, etc.). Email signatures can normally be set up in your email program very easily. Browse around your email program's menu bar to find out how to set up your signature or just look at the help files in order to figure it out. If your email program doesn't have a signature option available, try keeping your signatures in a text file and then cut and paste them into emails. This is less convenient, but another option non-the-less.

How can a signature help promote my business?

Consider all of the emails that you send out daily. You could harness the marketing power of email by adding information about your services to the end of each email. If even just one person remembers that John Doe is a web designer when they need a web site designed, John has gotten his name out there successfully.

For ex:

EX#1:
John Doe (JohnDoe@allgraphicdesign.com)
Inexpensive Web Design
http://www.allgraphicdesign.com/

How do I effectively use a signature?

1. Include your full name and email address (to make clickable use mailto: before email address)

2. Include your url (if you have a web site)

3. Brief description of your services

4. Use several different signatures - you will never know if your signature is working to its full potential if you don't test a few signatures out. Test out a signature for a few weeks and then try something different. Eventually after tweaking it for a while, you will find the perfect signature for your business. You should also try using a different signature for different situations. For example, if you want to stress inexpensive to an individual that has a tight budget and then stress talented to another person…this is a good strategy.

Make sure to keep your signatures brief. I cannot stress this enough. Take this following example:

EX#2:
John Doe (JohnDoe@allgraphicdesign.com)
You looking for an inexpensive web designer?
Look no further…I work cheap…and I'm good!
http://www.allgraphicdesign.com/

In the above example there is way too much text to sift thru. Noone will see your message, and your signature won't be effective. However with EX#1, you can't help but see "Inexpensive Web Design", the reason for this is because the signature is short and to the point.

There is no other marketing technique that is as easy as utilizing signatures. Signatures are included in all of your emails without you even having to think about it. Taking advantage of signatures is essential and necessary. Good Luck!