Chasing a Noodle

I receive a lot of emails from offshore web design companies asking if we would like to outsource our work to them. Normally I send the emails straight to the virtual grey, round filing cabinet without reading them. However, for some reason I read this guy’s first email and it irked me a little (always a bad thing). And he then followed it up with two more emails, which irked me a bit more. So I decided to hit him with one of my Pointless Letters. Here’s the thread, with his emails appearing first…

His First Email...

Dear Sir/Madam,   I am Peter, Business Development Manager,   We are an INDIA based Web Services Company with primary focus on Website Designing & Development.

We have our competency in CMS (Joomla, Modx, Mambo and other quality Content Management System) and e-commerce website.   As many as 90% websites do not bring business to their potential because they do not appeal to the target audience. And the reason most visitors leave a website is because of a complex design and navigation. So is your website really customer-ready? Not really, if we go by the analysis of our experts.   With an experience of developing more than 2500 websites successfully, we can help you earn more business from your website if you are ready to redesign your website.  Most of our clients have benefited from our expertise. Most firms from UK, USA, Canada and Australia overseas have achieved a significant amount of savings by outsourcing either complete or part of their work to us in India.    We wish you the best of luck and looking forward to a long and healthy business relationship with you.   Getting started is easy. Just mail us and we will definitely help you to achieve your business goals and objectives.   I look forward to your reply.

Peter Business Development Manager   Disclaimer: The CAN-SPAM Act of 2003 (Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography and Marketing Act) establishes requirements for those, who send commercial email, spells out penalties for spammers, and companies whose products are advertised in spam if they violate the guidelines, and gives consumers the right to ask emailers to control it.

His Second Email...

Hope you are doing well. Haven't heard back from you, just wondering if you are interested in our services. Let me know if you are interested and we can discuss this further.   I look forward to your response.

His Third Email...

I am Waiting for your response yet…… Kindly let us know if you are interested in our services, so that we can discuss it further. We will be happy to assist you and looking for your positive response.   I look forward to your response.

My Response...

Pete,

I hope you don’t mind me calling you Pete. Actually, I’ve changed my mind. Can I call you Greg? Thanks Greg.

Having read your response regarding my non-response to your response to your original email, I feel duty bound to respond. I am the Response Manager and my responsibility lies with responding to responses questioning lack of response. I do hope that makes sense.

Anyway, I reviewed your initial email and you’re absolutely right. Award yourself a big gold star and stick it to your handsome forehead, Crazy Chops. Our website is not ‘customer ready’. However, I’m sure that when I make you aware of our very niche target market, you’ll sink to your knees in amazement and realise the genius behind our work. We are actually the leading website in the world for meerkats with drink problems. That’s right - LEADING!

Now Betty, I know what you’re thinking (I hope you don’t mind the name change. I hate the name Greg - every Greg I’ve ever met in my life has been a crazy, deluded psychopath!). You’re wondering how you might be able to help us become EVEN BETTER. Well, let me lay it out for you big boy…

I believe that we could utilise your skills in Wordpress, Joomia, Modx, Jamiroquai, Scrabble and Deal Or No Deal to help us reach out to other possible target audiences. For example, elephants with halitosis or chipmunks with a gambling addiction. I’m sure you’ll appreciate that these are big markets with the potential to earn us millions of jelly babies every month.

As you can imagine, I look forward to seeing what proposals you might have for us. Not marriage ones though - we’re not in to that, unless you’re prepared line our hands with gold (or our stomachs with Gummy Berry Juice)

Anyway, I await your email with bated breath. However, with that said, I won’t be holding my breath for a response.

Yours truly, forever and ever, ‘til death do us part.

Bruce Picklebottom

Disclaimer: The Can Of Spam Act of 2003 requires me to recommend to you a pre-cooked meat product after every email. I would like to assure you that spam can be delicious, especially when served in between two slices of pre-toasted bread, perhaps with the addition of an optional slice of cheese (note that cheese is not automatically included). If you wish to opt out of eating said pork product, you can do so by choosing not to open your mouth.

With the Internet businesses I run, I receive a lot of feedback emails. The majority are really pleasant and useful, and I reply in-kind. But, just occasionally, I receive one that gets my goat. I mean, it’s not difficult to be pleasant, is it? So, today, because I was in a funny mood, I decided to reply with one of my pointless letters. His email was about the search engine on one of my websites.

Here is the email I received…

I entered the sought after abbreviation with a few leading and trailing spaces. Your search engine failed to find any expansion. This is a very poor show on your part. It's the programmers' duty to remove leading and trailing spaces, Not the users'. Please let me know when this has been fixed.

My response:

Dear X,

Thank you for your email. Your suggestion to remove spaces is one of the best we have received this week, second only to the idea of strapping flapjacks to pigs, which we are currently looking into (you should see the prototype, it really is something to behold).

Far from being a company who simply jump in and adopt every suggestion that comes our way, we like to take time to assess the positives and negatives of every suggestion. Yours is no exception. I’m excited to be able to tell you that we only found one negative, and it is this. As I’m sure you’re aware, several spaces in a row can make an abbreviation in itself. It is commonly used for giving a person time to think and breathe. Without these spaces, people may be forced to not take pauses between words or sentences, whichwouldbeterribleandmakeitverydifficulttounderstandwhattheyaresaying.

Despite coming up with that particular negative, we can see no others. So, I’m delighted to be able to tell you that we have taken your feedback onboard and have updated our search system to include this fantastic new feature. Now, although I’d like to take the development of our search engine a step further in assisting you and make it prepare you a mug of Bovril, massage your feet at the end of a long day and wipe your bottom for you, i regret that I won’t be able to do that. Still, don’t let that stop you from doing those things yourself, eh?

Please don’t let what I’ve said detract from the fact that your suggestion was a very good one. I have no doubt that it will improve the lives of tens of people throughout the world, all of whom might have been unable to fathom the idea of removing a space from before or after their search term before carrying out their search. May they be eternally grateful and send you Christmas cards year after year… assuming they can lick their own stamp for the envelope…