Email

Problems with email use

Everyday, business lose valuable time and money dealing with SPAM. SPAM, which has come to stand for unsolicited email, is a major drag on office efficiency. Here at Pentad, we have come up with a list of recommended changes that can effectively end the SPAM problem.

Causes and Costs of SPAM

Using bob@bobshipping.com as an example, Bob lets everyone know his email address. Bob has his email address posted on the Contact Us page of his website. Bob also has signed up for numerous on-line newsletters using the same email address. Bob also has interests in other companies for which he has additional email addresses – all which forward to bob@bobshipping.com. In less than a year, Bob is receiving upwards of 50 SPAM emails per day. Because Bob only has a desktop computer, he uses the webmail portal mail.bobshipping.com when he travels. This portal has a SPAM filter activated. In addition, Bob’s desktop computer has Outlook which has another built-in SPAM filter. So Bob checks two different SPAM FOLDERS for messages that may have been incorrectly tagged as SPAM. It is easy to see that SPAM costs Bob at least ten minutes of time per day. According to Ferris Research, spam cost American corporations about $168 per employee for 2004. When we inflate that to 2007 dollars, the cost is in excess of $200 per employee. For Bob and his nine employees that use email, the cost is over $2000 per year.

First:

Create Email Aliases for all employees that use email There are many great addresses to use such as manager@, sales@, accounting@, billing@, dispatch@, shop@, quotes@, etc.

Second:

Create Formal Email Addresses for each employee that uses email I prefer the format [first name].[last name]@. So we’ll have bob.smith@bobshipping.com, john.doe@bobshipping.com, etc.

Third:

Set-up each employee’s Outlook to grab email from both their ALIAS and their FORMAL email accounts.

Fourth:

Install a high-powered intelligent SPAM filter on everyone’s Outlook and remove all other SPAM filters.

Fifth:

Remove email addresses from web-pages and install email forms. theoakscca.org has a great example of this method. Email addresses are not visible; however, a person can still send an email to anyone on staff by filling out a form.

Sixth:

Train Employees.
Do not give out your FORMAL email address to any external person, customer, vendor, etc. Instead – give them your ALIAS. There are many benefits of this approach:
1. You will get Spammed. So – when this happens, we change the ALIAS. This is much easier than asking an employee to change either their first or last name!
2. Email redirection during Vacation and Sick-leave coverage is extremely easier with the ALIAS scheme.
3. When you travel, you only need to check your FORMAL email using the web mail portal. Because this is not a “public” email address, 95% of the email messages should be real – what a time saver!
4. If you use a cell phone to retrieve your FORMAL email, this elimination of SPAM will greatly reduce megabyte overage charges on your cell bill.
5. When employees get re-assigned or retire from the company, email redirection is also greatly simplified. External people can still use the same ALIAS – it just goes to a new employee.