WiseStamp: Are You Leveraging Ancient Technologies to Improve Your Social Media Standing?

The ancient technology I am referring to is email of course.

The idea is simple. You wouldn’t hand out a business card (another ancient technology) without your phone number on it, right?

So why would you “hand out” your email without your Social Media contact information in it?

Here is what your email signature might look like…if you were me.

Click to Enlarge.

I know that looks pretty fancy but it was actually quite easy to achieve using a tiny (and free) little snap-in for Firefox called Wise Stamp (also available for Chrome and Safari. IE Edition is in the works).

Before I get into the how, let me share my “why”.

There is precious few reasons for small and medium sized businesses (under 500 people) to host their own email systems or even pay for it.

Get It? "Seal" of approval? A stamp is a seal plus WiseStamp has my seal of approval. I know. Hilarious. Click on the seal to share WiseStamp on Facebook.

Google has a robust, feature-full and free email system you can use with your own domain-name appended at the end (as in yourname@yourdomain.com) even tho it ultimately arrives in your GMail account.

How? Well, that’s a topic for another post. Drop a comment if you really want to find out.

This can save your company thousands of dollars a month with very few side effects or limiting factors.

Here is one limitation I can think of. A law firm might be required to “own” their email system, whilst people and companies with GMail accounts ultimately don’t “own” their email; we’re supposed to trust Google with it. A topic for yet another discussion perhaps?

Anyways, back to our regularly schedule program. WiseStamp install.

Point your browser to Wisestamp and install it.

By the way, did you notice the seal above? You can click on it to share on Facebook.

Its done? Great! Let’s set up that profile. Shall we?

First, access Wisestamp. It installs itself in the lower right corner of Firefox but you can also access it from the Tools Menu.

Click to Enlarge

Click on the Table Button, and create 2 columns and 1 row. This should suffice for a simple signature lay out that includes your pic.

If you’re going to include both picture and contact info (like I did) I strongly recommend you set up a 2x1 table. As shown in picture.

Once the table is created the insertion point will blink in the first quadrant. You can leave it as-is and click on “Insert Image” button (right next to Table Button).

You will need to enter the URL for the desired image. I used my Twitter profile URL just because it was handy, but you can enter any accessible URL.

Once you click on “Insert” your picture will appear in the first quadrant. The second quadrant will contain your phone/web/social info.

Fill in the info with relevant information, and your basic contact info (name, phone, web, business address, etc) and you’re all set.

Next up, use the tabs to add your Social media contact info. BA-GOOSH!!!

While we’re here, familiarize yourself with the interface. Its quite intuitive and easy to set up.

Easy as pie.

One of the few benefits of running a heavy eMail client (like outlook) is that it gives you a robust feature-set. Signature is one such feature…but keep this in mind.

The free line keeps moving. Things we used to pay for are now free.

Business folks I talk to, nine times out of ten, can make-do with a free eMail system. How bout you?

How much (per year) do you spend on EMail systems maintenance, upgrades, security, support, etc?

Besides already mentioned, state-mandated eMail setup (for law firms), what objections would you have to google hosting your business email?

Very related posts:

Making Your Internet Browsing Safe From Prying Eyes at Work.

Why Business Owners Must Take Web Design Into Their Own Hands

Why Business Owners Must Become Expert Marketers

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