The Importance of Your Own Email Account

January 29, 2009 · Comments

mailboxes I’m going through my databases, checking up on who I haven’t talked with lately. I realized that a LOT of people I know have lost their jobs or moved on. This means that many of their corporate email addresses aren’t any good to me. Think on that.

Either get a gmail/yahoo/hotmail account, or buy a domain that can be yours forever. Use that email for secondary contact with any business contacts you might want to retain across many relationships. Do your work on your work email, but keep a “stay in touch” channel alive.

And work often on your own databases. Repeat after me: you live or die by your databases. I learned that working with Jeff Pulver. It’s a lesson that sticks with me to this day.

When I say this, I don’t mean anything especially difficult. I might just mean different types of contact lists. And by different types, that’s the power. My company, for instance, has a database of names who might be interested in marketing, PR and business communications. My company has a database for our events. It’s how we know who to reach with appropriate information that they want.

But personally, I’ve got databases of people I’ve reached out to like you, and I’m working on those databases.

For instance, I just took the contacts from my various mail software, the contacts in LinkedIn, and a few other sources, and I pushed them all into BatchBook, my web-based contact management software. In there, I’m slicing up those contacts into “people I want to touch base with more often,” “people I can reach out to with a project,” “personal advisory board,” and “family.”

Now, with those lists in place, I can then either send individual emails and check in, or if it’s a group type of thing, I can use Blue Sky Factory, my email platform, and send out a batch of mail.

Contact is important. Keeping your networks alive is important. Having more than your corporate email address for me to reach you is important.

In 2009, I can tell you this is all very important.

What are you doing about any of this?

Photo credit SC Fiasco

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  • Absolutely! I usually maintain two email addresses for just about everybody I connect with. I also encourage to people to start developing themselves as an individual outside of work. Work is one of the many things they do, but it is not their entire person.

    I am still stuck on Outlook for contact though. Will check out your online options.
  • I have always followed these rules:

    - Use one e-mail account that I always give to people to contact me friends & relatives. (It's the same email address I've had since college.)

    - I never give my work email out to friends or sites/forums, mainly because I don't want to mix my work with play.

    - I make a copy of my contacts in more than one area just in case the computer or email server or soemthing goes bye-bye one day.

    Thanks for the great blog.
    @jayphilips
  • Instead of giving everyone different email addresses, I save everyone's contact info for saving keeping. If I were ever to change emails (or lose it), then I email everyone and tell them of the change and also to spark conversations again.

    Isn't this what we used to do in the old days? Calling everyone to tell them we changed pager numbers?
  • ckanal
    Smart. Same goes for students too because those .edu addresses don't last forever! In this economic climate and with so many unknowns in '09, you're absolutely right; it's essential that people stay organized with their networks and forms of correspondence!
  • Well, I own LOTS of websites. Which one should I choose?

    Really, this is a good thought.
  • I personally run into this problem all the time between my multiple e-mail accounts. I finally swallowed my pride and spent all of a Sunday on migrating them to Google, then exporting those into a CSV for long-term keeping.

    ~Joe
  • Good stuff. Could I suggest that for the average person Gmail would be a sound bet. I have several other pop3 accounts and use Gmail as my 'email portal' if you like - my gateway into all my email accounts. Needless to say this all works very well in Gmail.
  • I have had the same old personal e-mail address for years. Every once and a while I will get a message from an old buddy in between the mountains of spam.
  • That is one of the benefits of starting up as a freelancer, you protected that permanent email.

    Now everything forwards to that email via gmail hosted apps, and I am able to reply as the address the email was sent to. Works out very well.
  • I also encourage to people to start developing themselves as an individual outside of work. Work is one of the many things they do, but it is not their entire person.
  • Irrespective of the technology, contacts are the equivalent of flint and tinder - they are the one thing between you and the cold,cold darkness. keep your contacts lists close. I make sure I keep my contact details in a way that is easily exportable and I keep an offline copy.
  • Chris, thanks for an extremely valuable point: I bought my domain in '94 and have been working in tech since. I know so many CIOs and other techies who don't have their domains or permanent emails, and I've never understood that. It's fundamental to being on the grid; it'd be interesting to study how many millions are lost each year because a former colleague tries to reach out with an oppy, and the transaction cost can be prohibitive when you lose touch. Since I really can't expect someone to have their own domain, the next best is school emails. Thanks for mentioning the tools you use; I'll check them out, too. Cheers-
  • Good advice indeed, Chris. We in VoIP are going through problems with phone numbers. If your telco goes away, you can ask for that number you've given to people for years but you don't always get it. With email, it's much easier. For $10 a year you can own a domain name of you choice and keep it forever. You can lock it in 10 years at a time if you like.
    My own strategy is more complex. I have my own domains which I control for business and close friends. I also have trademark accounts at every major email provider. I also use Gmail for those whose sheer quantity and weight of email requires a lot of filing. Finally, I have Sneakemail.com to invent new throw away emails for subscriptions and travel inquiries, where it's sometimes impossible to unsubscribe. With sneakemail, you just turn it off.
  • Re: "And work often on your own databases. Repeat after me: you live or die by your databases."

    When I was in lending I set about building my own database and started an email newsletter using the web-based program provided through the packaged site I purchased. I used it a lot! And for all intended purposes it worked out well. Except for one thing: my contacts were stored via this web-based program with this company who decided to not offer their product anymore. So I lost all my contacts and had to start all over again.

    Lesson learned (the hard way). I used to use ACT (I liked it a lot but it was a company account). I keep and update my contacts regularly through Address Book on my mac and I have a newsletter account through madmimi for my site and to manage the newsletter for the REBarcamp LA event I'm putting on in April.
  • I ran into this exact issue a few years back (moving jobs without a personal email). Then it was a matter of exporting - importing - bulk mailing. Cludgy and I'm sure it pissed a few folk off as I was moving every couple of years.

    GMail gets my vote for personal account, I also use it for the back-end heavy lifting on my hosted domain email. I (try) to get on socially with everyone I work with so although my personal email is obviously not on work business cards, I usually ask if we can connect through other sources (LinkedIn is great for this).

    I use Plaxo as my global address book (backed up on cvs regularly). The blog & twitter are also great ways of staying in touch and maintaining conversations with people even if I can't always be down the pub with them! :)
  • This is so right, and it is also very important to keep a place on the Internet where people can find you - something more permanent that each new social network... somewhere people can ALWAYS find you. It sounds redundant, but social networks come and go. You keep chrisbrogan.com for example... great for mail address changes and better than Plaxo because so many people avoid Plaxo like a plague (even though i am a user).
  • Hmm. Is this another way of saying own your own space? What if Facebook just went away today. 11:22 am, Facebook ceases operations. Or Twitter just disappeared due to lack of funding. Or what if Google stopped Gmail. Just gone. Sorry, folks, you didn't pay anything for our services, so we don't owe you anything. Didn't you all read the fine print?

    If an email address or a web site is a lifeline to YOU, make sure you own it.
  • I do the same thing. I have one personal email for my friends and family and another for other stuff.
  • Ray
    Fantastic advice. While you are employed save at least 6 months living expenses and have your own email to be ready for career transition!

    Already in transition, remember Linked In is a powerful tool as well. People who get their email bounced at your old work address can always find you on Linked In. It's been a lifesaver for me.

    -Ray
  • Free email used to appear less credible, but gmail changed it. Now I regularly use my gmail account as the main contact address.

    I created many email address under the company's domain for different departments from the start, even if I don't have that department yet. Not to create a "huge" impression, but to compartmentalize email properly - using Google Apps.

    I have a domain name which I'm going to take with me forever, just like yours but my gmail account sticks.
  • @Hendry Lee Pufferfish Marketing, I love it. Another thing to do is use Skype or Grand Central to have different phone numbers for different divisions.. and if you select area codes like 718, 612, 202, etc, you can have different "offices" as well... with Skype, different country codes now, your company is international... and make sure to grab the domains (.eu, but partner up with someone in the EU for an "office" address....)
  • Jeremy LeRay
    I have been moving most of my personal email to Gmail. I got tired of my ISP being sold and changing names (and my email address) every couple of years. Rufus makes a good point though. May need to rethink my strategy again. Going to take a look at BatchBook too. Hard to beat a good .csv file if all else fails.
  • Interesting timing. Just today we at Relenta, email-based contact and task manager are starting to test a new feature that allows people in your contact database to keep their own contact details up to date. You send a personalized email to individual contacts, groups or entire database which contains a unique link that each person can follow to update their contact info (and enter alternative/personal email address among other fields).

    I've heard many good things about BatchBook and BlueSkyFactory.

    Relenta differs from all these great standalone apps because it's a hybrid between a contact manger, email client, task manager, and email marketing application. So instead of using four different apps you can use one.

    Here's our elevator pitch at TechCrunch.

    Chris, many hanks for validating our approach to email management :)
  • @Jeremy LeRay hey, thanks! Yes, concurrence on the CSV.. text only files never fail... amazing how in the midst of the greatest technology in the world, the basics are what never fails. A pencil, piece of paper, text-only file, a human conversation over a beer... hmmmm.....
  • Hello Chris,
    Having your own email address is also important for personal branding. Having firstname@firstnamelastname.com is far more professional (expecially if you are looking for a job) than happymama98765@hotmail.com. Your email address sends a little message about your personal brand. Make sure it is on-brand for you - or at least professional.

    Best.
    William
    www.williamarruda.com
  • "... a human conversation over a beer..." an oft overlooked social networking principle!
  • I use an e-mail through my university for day-to-day contact with people and my personal development strategies (i.e., the e-mail listed on my blog). This is an alumni account that not only shows I graduated from a fantastic university -- Hook'em Horns -- but it is also automatically forwarded to my work account, so I don't have to worry about checking more than one e-mail. Then if I leave my current place of employment, I just have to change the forwarding address. It is nice and simple.
  • This is a good point to touch on, one that I have often thought about but never seen anyone write about. It is so important in this day and age to keep a personal email address for a few reasons. Getting fired or leaving your job is definitely one of them. You are always going to want to keep your contacts, some professional, some personal. Think ahead and plan for that.
  • Tony C
    Yes and it's time many web sites, allow you have two email address's. LInkedin, is one of the few that has a solid system for a office email and secondary email.
  • This is very valuable and helpful. Thank you for always sharing how do to what you suggest. Your links and tips and thoughts will be what keeps my company a float in 2009!

    Thank you!
  • I agree with you, though I have never given out my secondary email because I own my own company. Now that you have raised this issue, I should give out my gmail email address because there were times when I had problems with my service provider and my emails bounced. Thanks Chris, I always learn so much from you. I hope that one day I can return the favour. Avil http://www.twitter.com/avilbeckford
  • Chris,
    As a business, we are trying to collect 'secondary' email addresses for our email lists, so that if we do get a bounce on the primary address, we can send a follow up email to the secondary email list. Ideally, I'd even like to have our system set up to send a postcard to the contact's physical address checking in case the secondary email is no longer valid too. Very timely tip!
  • @eric Postcards WORK for confirmations wonderfully. http://www.tourneycentral.com/using-postcards-a... despite what Rick Burnes at HubSpot says about the future of the USPS and direct mail.
  • I think this is a great piece of advice. It is something I've been doing since my last "job upheaval" about eight years ago.

    I'm always surprised to find out that this is not the norm - that people actually just use their work email as their primary connection point.

    I changed that in my own office, I think, when I "infected" the place with LinkedIn. I tried hard to get everyone to use, as you suggest, a 'go-anywhere' address for their primary LI contact.

    The reason that this is an advantage became much more clear to everyone as they were filling out their LI profile because, after all, if this thing becomes useful it might be due to a downsizing!
  • In which Chris reminds Leslie that she has been slacking on her contact list backups lately.... ;)
  • This is a problem I have ALOT. I have made some really great contacts over time and I have lost most of them because either myself or them would lose access to the contact info. Backing up is useless if the email address is gone. Great post.
    @bookerx3
  • steveellwood
    Chris, following your advice in Elements of a Personal Brand and an appeal from @RichardDennison Come out, come out, wherever you are …

    ... I put my blog in my name, and email in the blog domain, and I can move those as you suggest. Am I pleased my online identity isn't irrevocably tied up with my employer? Yes, for sure. So thanks.
  • I've been using GMail for almost 5 years and couldn't live without it. The forwarding and multiple account capabilities are so useful.
  • Grant
    While this is all great advice don't forget about your phone! I always synchronise my phone with Outlook and also make a backup file of the contacts and numbers.
  • As a community manager, I would love to learn more about batchbook! I am heading there now. Hoping they have a 30 day trial. I am incompetent when it comes to organization. Thanks for the lead Chris!
  • I think it's more about what you do with your database or your network rather than the database itself. Like you are doing, if you add value to someone's life, their business etc, then you matter. Plus the more you give, the more you get, which is not consistent with the traditional economy. I have several email databases and have never aggregated them as such.

    The issue to me is then the quality of your touch. If I send you an email saying blah blah blah, I'm good, having fun, it's hot, hope you are hot. I'm not adding any value. If I send messages to a group, it needs to add value to their day, or it just adds to the perseption that email is one of the biggest time wasters ever and if you send me time wasting email, I don't need to hear from you. If you send me value, then I will keep an eye out for your messages and read them first.

    I'm in danger of getting on the soap box so thanks for the discussion:D
  • Tom
    I started rolling all my email accounts onto gmail, where I can easily check them. I love the tagging feature.
    I'm trying to get more into 'Cloud Computing' ...
    I like the idea of a centralized web-based place to keep all contacts - I've heard Plaxo is good, too?
  • Its one reason I love LinkedIn. You never lose track of people as long as they keep updating their LinkedIn account email address.
  • In my case, after two shameful logins in Yahoo and Gmail, I bought rica.cr and started costa.rica.cr, being my main driver to have an email address like firstname@costa.rica.cr
    Something else I did is to buy another domain and set a catch-all rule towards a single account - which I import from my costa.rica.cr account. Why? When I go to a site that needs my email but I do not trust enough to sell it, I make up an address in this domain (something like suspicioussite@mydomain.com) If they ever sell the address I would quickly tell because of the email address.
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