Tips for Sending Successful Email Inquiries

Those of you who have been with us for awhile may recall when we allowed our registered employers to contact jobseekers directly, using their own email provider. This permitted employers to send messages in any format they wished, via their preferred email applications. It also relieved us of having to rely on our mail server to deliver tens of thousands of daily messages. Unfortunately, the open nature of the old system was vulnerable to some serious abuse. As we grew larger, it became necessary for us to develop an in-house email system whereby all initial inquiries pass through our mail server. This in-house system allows us to protect our users by quickly blocking any abusive senders. Moreover, our system is redundant to ensure all messages get delivered. Even if an email address goes bad, jobseekers can still view any messages you send by checking their inbox on our site. The improved system has been rigorously tested against all the popular services, such as Gmail, Yahoo, Hotmail, and AOL, and we have consistently achieved excellent delivery rates. To ensure that our mail server continues to remain whitelisted and your emails don't get marked as spam, we ask that you follow the tips below:

Keep Your Messages Brief But Informative. When first contacting a jobseeker, it is always best to be concise and to the point. Nobody wants to wade through a huge block of text to decide whether to respond to a job offer. Besides, it is unlikely that you will close the deal based on your first email, so we recommend that you save all the finer details for your follow-up exchanges and stick to the most important facts in your initial inquiry. Don't be repetitive or provide a lot of extraneous information, and definitely don't include typos or misspelled words, as that can be a major turn-off.
Be Professional and Courteous. It's no secret that people like to be treated with respect and consideration. Keep in mind that many employers are competing for the attention of the jobseekers listed on this site. To separate yourself from the others, a kind and thoughtful message that acknowledges this basic reality can go a long way. It will also demonstrate that you run a serious business.
Make a Clear and Specific Job Offer. The biggest mistake an employer can make is to send a vague message that doesn't contain a clear job offer. This is exactly the kind of email a jobseeker is likely to ignore or delete. After all, it does not address why they are on the site in the first place. They want work! So please make sure that your initial email message describes the type of work you are offering.
Don't Send The Same Message To Every Jobseeker. Take the time to compose a message that reflects a jobseeker's unique objectives and qualifications. Sending individualized messages will also reduce the chance of your emails being flagged as junk or spam and help to keep our mail server whitelisted.
Provide Complete and Accurate Contact Information. Make it as easy as possible for jobseekers to reply to your inquiry. We highly recommend that you include a contact name, a business name, a phone number, and a valid email address in every message you send. We also suggest you include a website link. If you don't have a website, there are a million free services that will allow you to create one. Get a Myspace page, a Facebook account, or whatever, but make sure you have a link that jobseekers can click on to learn more about you and your business. Of course, you should also post an Employer Ad on our site -- more on that below.
Don’t Put Links or HTML in the Body of Your Message. If you have a link you want to include with your message, list it in the website field, not in the body of your message. Make sure you do not put any HTML code in the message. Why not? For starters, it's a violation of our Terms and Conditions. Secondly, it will make your message much more likely to be marked as junk by the recipient's email service provider. For best success, use short messages with text only.
Don’t Use Rude, Hateful or Obscene Language in Your Message. Hopefully, we don' t need to explain to you why this is a very bad idea. Number one, we'll kick you off the site if you do this. Number two, your message is unlikely to get delivered anyway, since most email service providers filter bad language and throw these kinds of messages into a junk folder.
Keep Track of Who You've Already Emailed. You definitely don't want to hound a jobseeker. We suggest you allow a waiting period of at least 2-4 weeks before emailing a jobseeker a second time. Fortunately, our system makes it easy to track jobseekers to whom you've already sent messages. Whenever you visit the resume of a jobseeker you've already emailed, you will be shown the last date you sent a message to this person. This date will appear directly to the right of the link that says, "Click here to send me email." You can also check your Sent Mail to see a complete record of all the messages you've sent to jobseekers.
Report Bad Email Addresses. If you receive an "undeliverable mail" message after attempting to contact a jobseeker, you may report the problem to us by clicking on the "Bad Email" link in your Sent Mail box. This will help us to make sure our jobseeker database remains up to date. Rest assured, as mentioned above, our system is redundant to ensure all messages get delivered. Even if an email address has gone bad, jobseekers can still view any messages you send by checking their inbox on our site.
Upgrade to an Employer Ad. Many jobseekers on our site respond to employer ads, but they don't choose to post their own resumes. In addition, many jobseekers prefer to work with employers who have listings on our site, as it adds credibility to their business. For these reasons, if you are serious about recruitment, the best value is to purchase or upgrade to an Employer Ad package. Once you place an Employer Ad, you will have access to an Inbox containing all the responses you receive from jobseekers. Plus, whenever you send a message to a jobseeker, it will automatically include a link to your ad, as well as to all the contact information in your ad.