Why GMAIL is not for business
As per usual, our website is flooding Marketing Eye with leads - so many in fact, that we are turning companies that are not a good fit away.
My last call, was very interesting. It was from an interstate online business looking to grow their business-to-business client base.
After chatting for 20 minutes, it became apparent that the business was not suited to Marketing Eye. They pushed to receive a proposal even though I had already told them that they were not suited to our format of working with clients, and then even after saying this, they proceeded to provide me with a gmail address.
Are you serious? Do you think in a business to business environment, that it would be appropriate to provide a prospect or anyone else for that matter with a gmail address? Do you really think they will take you seriously?
My last call, was very interesting. It was from an interstate online business looking to grow their business-to-business client base.
After chatting for 20 minutes, it became apparent that the business was not suited to Marketing Eye. They pushed to receive a proposal even though I had already told them that they were not suited to our format of working with clients, and then even after saying this, they proceeded to provide me with a gmail address.
Are you serious? Do you think in a business to business environment, that it would be appropriate to provide a prospect or anyone else for that matter with a gmail address? Do you really think they will take you seriously?
This business has been around for a couple of years. They called us - we didn't call them. So, why then do they think a gmail address would be suffice? After commenting on this, they then provided us with an info@ address. Once again, do you think someone is going to take you seriously in a business to business environment providing this email address. Of course, we declined to provide them with a proposal. But this is a great lesson for any business seeking to grow and to be taken as a serious business - do not give out a gmail account or a info@ account. People can tell that you are a backyard business when you do this.
Does anyone else feel the same?
Here are 3 reasons why you should drop handing out a GMAIL address when doing business:
1. GMAIL is for personal use, not business.
2. It shows people that you are a very small business. Always act like a big successful business, even if you haven't quite made it yet.
3. It highlights that you don't know your target audience well enough and their expectations.
Leave a comment
Make sure you enter all the required information, indicated by an asterisk (*). HTML code is not allowed.
comments ( 9 )
CHAT
25 Apr 2014I visited a lot of website but I think this one has got something special in it. "Children have neither a past nor a future. Thus they enjoy the present-- which seldom happens to us." by Jean de la Bruyere.
Replyweb site
24 Apr 2014Thank you for every other great post. The place else may
Replyanyone get that kind of info in such an ideal method of writing?
I have a presentation next week, and I am on the search for such information.
Yvonne
09 Jul 2012Gmail and Hotmail are the two worst offenders at making a business look unprofessional! I mean, it even makes students applying for a job look unworthy of a placement! I agree that businesses that want to make it need to have a professional email address, otherwise it just gets untidy.
ReplyDavid
06 Jul 2012Even giving out my personal hotmail or gmail accounts to friends makes me cringe. I would never dare give it out to businesses when im a business professional.
ReplyPeter Larter
06 Jun 2012I couldn't agree more either. Nice article.
ReplyAt the risk of sounding whiney, my view is... If someone is not organised and serious enough to organise a domain name and domain name email address, how can you be sure they are serious and organised enough to provide a good product or service?
swiss replica watches
02 Jun 2012Your website have very interesting article. I got knowledge from here. Besides that, your blog is so popular among the searchers from search engines.A good watch may let you cause more brilliant! It means yours website is very good.
ReplySandra
01 Jun 2012Agreed! All businesses should have a professional email. I can understand if they are just starting out but after a couple of years it must change. Customers/clients will remember your email if it's in-line with your website address therefore another reason to drop the GMAIL.
ReplyRich McPharlin
29 May 2012Thats a good rule if you deal with only western companies, but try dealing with anyone in southeast asia an sooner or later your going to come up with alot of yahoo, 163 and gmail accounts.
ReplyBelinda Weaver @Copywrite Matters
29 May 2012I couldn't agree more Mellissah and I would happily extend it to @bigpond, @hotmail, @insertproviderhere.
ReplyI appreciate that when you are starting out, you might not be ready to get your mail server sorted. I've been there and I wasn't. But as soon as you start actually marketing your business, your email address needs to domain name oriented.
As you said, it's a signal about how well established you are and in turn, how seriously you want to be taken as a business owner.
PS When I first clicked your tweet link I thought it was going to be a post about why the Gmail app (as a Google App) was pants. As a Google-App-er I say PHEW! ;)