The Act of Responding – old hat?
I don’t know about you, but if I email someone with a request for advice, a quote, or something else, I kind of expect a response acknowledging they’ve received my email.
I don’t mean an autoresponder and I’m not into using the read receipt option (a whole other story there) but a response email that just lets me know it has been received and read, and they’ll get back to me with an answer later.
Whether we like it or not, society has become one that requires quick answers and quick fixes and email has helped produce that expectation.
While I’m not expecting service or product providers to drop everything at my beck and call, I certainly don’t expect to wait 4, 5 or more days for a response – usually if I’ve enquired about something it means I’m looking for that thing now and would like to know if it’s available, doable, achievable, deliverable.
If I don’t hear back from the person I emailed within 2 or 3 days I email them again and then if I still don’t get a response I ring them up. Result is they think I’m nagging them or something. Huh? Am I in the wrong? I don’t think so.
I know if a prospective client contacts me for some work to be done they don’t wait around very long for an answer. They go off to the very next VA business they can find to get the answer they’re looking for. So even if I don’t have an answer on the spot (I need to research for some information for example), I will at least email them a reply letting them know I’ve seen their email and will get back to them very soon with an answer. What do you do?
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