Well-read

Keep your e-mails out of the trash.

Who are you and what do you want to tell me? Answers to these two questions, in that order, are what people want to know before they decide if they will open your e-mail. Which means you should give some thought to those items if you don’t want your e-mail communications lumped in with spam and other discarded messages.

If your outgoing e-mail messages show your "From" information as something other than your name, you might want to change that. People who know you are more likely to open your messages if they immediately see your name rather than a company name or convoluted e-mail address not familiar to them. Many spam messages come with a common first name and no last name, so that also may be a bad choice. Don’t know what shows up when you send a message? Send an e-mail to yourself and see.

To make a change in Outlook, go to Tools > E-mail accounts, select View or change existing e-mail accounts, then click Next. Click the Change button, then type your name as you want it to appear in the Your Name field. Click Next, then Finish. In Outlook Express, go to Tools > Accounts, highlight your e-mail account, and click Properties. Change your name in the User Information and click OK.

When choosing a subject line for an e-mail, try to be specific yet brief. Information you requested is more likely to be mistaken for spam and get deleted unread than House on 1323 Penobscot Dr.

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