You know that e-mail is a fast and simple way to communicate with people. But e-mail can also help you manage many areas of your business.
Use e-mail to coordinate projects, keep your team on the same page, maintain and grow your customer base, and make it easy for your customers to contact you.
This article explores key ways that e-mail can help you manage your communication needs and give you more time to manage your business.
Note The information in this article applies to people who read their e-mail in Microsoft Office Live Small Business. If you signed up for Office Live Small Business using a Windows Live
ID that ends in "@hotmail.com", "@live.com", or "@msn.com", your e-mail appears in Office Live Small Business automatically. If you cannot see your e-mail in Office Live Small Business, it is likely that you signed up using a Windows Live ID based on an e-mail address that Office Live Small Business cannot access. However, you can create new e-mail accounts that give you access to all of the convenient and powerful e-mail management tools in Office Live Small Business. For more information, see Why can't I see my e-mail?
In this article
Communicate with colleagues
Every minute that your team spends searching for information, sifting through junk mail, or trying to reach one another is time that could be spent delivering for customers and building your business. So how can e-mail help keep everyone working together effectively?
Office Live Small Business gives you exactly the e-mail tools that you need to help keep your business running efficiently.
Add e-mail accounts
Your Office Live Small Business account includes at least 25 and as many as 100 e-mail accounts so that you can create accounts for everyone on your team. Each e-mail account includes 5 gigabytes (GB) of storage space to enable you to keep important messages and attachments easily available. For more information about how to create accounts, see Create or delete e-mail accounts.
Note Before you create an account, make sure that you select the domain name that you want. If you do not have your own domain, new e-mail addresses will end with "@officeliveusers.com." You can use your existing domain names with your Office Live Small Business account or create new domain names. For more information about creating domains, see
Purchase a domain name.
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Access e-mail from anywhere
Everyone who has an Office Live Small Business e-mail account can access e-mail from any computer that has an Internet connection. Remember that when you sign in to Office Live Small Business, you have access to all of the information that you need to stay connected, from e-mail to contacts and shared documents.
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Organize and filter your e-mail
Each e-mail account has a set of folders that includes Inbox, Junk, Drafts, Sent, and Deleted folders. You can add as many folders as you want to organize messages by project, client, or whatever method works best for you. To create a new folder, on the
Mail toolbar, click the arrow next to the
New button, and then click Folder. Type a name for your folder, and then press ENTER.
Additionally, a junk mail filter helps you save time by automatically redirecting unwanted mail to the Junk folder. By default, mail remains in the Junk folder for 10 days, so you can check the Junk folder periodically to make sure that important messages are not accidentally deleted. If a message appears in the Junk folder that you want to keep, select the message, and then, on the e-mail toolbar, click Not junk.
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Use Outlook to manage your e-mail
You can use Microsoft Office Outlook to access, send, and receive e-mail messages from multiple Office Live Small Business e-mail accounts. Take advantage of the powerful organization tools in Outlook to quickly categorize or search for messages and to keep your messages and contacts always in sync.
Just download and install the free Outlook Connector tool, and then import your Office Live Small Business e-mail accounts into Outlook with only a few clicks. Outlook Connector automatically sets up your Office Live Small Business mail folders in Outlook for each account that you add.
You can also manage your Office Live Small Business contacts in Outlook and even drag contacts between your Outlook contact list and your Office Live Small Business contacts. And because Outlook Connector automatically syncs your mail and contacts with Office Live Small Business, you will always see the same messages and contacts in your folders, whether you access your Office Live Small Business mail accounts through Outlook or in Office Live Small Business.
Note If you have to compose and manage e-mail messages or edit contacts in Outlook while you are offline, Outlook Connector automatically updates your information the next time that you connect to the Internet. For more information about Outlook Connector, see Use Microsoft Office Outlook.
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Connect instantly with your team
Want to connect even quicker than e-mail? Use Windows Live Messenger to keep everyone always on the same page. Every Office Live Small Business e-mail address is a Windows Live ID. Just download and install
Windows Live Messenger
for free, and then chat instantly with text, video, or computer-to-computer calling. Windows Live Messenger also enables you to quickly and easily share files from your computer. For more information, see Use Windows Live Messenger.
Note Although the Windows Live Messenger services mentioned here are free, some may require additional equipment. For example, you must have a Web camera to participate in a video discussion and a compatible microphone and speakers for computer-to-computer calling.
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Connect with customers
If your business has an online presence, e-mail is your primary link to online customers. E-mail can be an equally powerful tool for helping you connect with all of your customers, whether they walk into your shop or office, or visit you on the Web.
Manage customer accounts
E-mail also automatically organizes your communication with customers. It gives you a dated, written record of each communication so that you know at
a
glance when you sent an invoice or when your employee responded to a support request.
When you must quickly locate messages, you can sort or filter the messages in any of your mail folders. Click Sort by at the top of your list of messages, and then click to select an option to sort messages by date, sender, subject, or message size, or to filter messages so that only specified messages (such as those from a particular sender) appear.
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Help customers connect with you
E-mail provides your customers with a fast and easy way to communicate with you at their convenience and can make it easier for you to respond to customer requests.
Instead of having to call you or come into your business location during working hours, customers can use e-mail to contact you when it is convenient for them. Receiving customer communication by e-mail also gives you the time to consider requests and respond thoughtfully without keeping the customer waiting.
You can make it easier for customers to contact you and provide yourself with better organization tools in the process, by creating unique e-mail addresses for different purposes. For example, if your domain is fourthcoffee.com, you can create separate accounts named info@fourthcoffee.com, support@fourthcoffee.com, sales@fourthcoffee.com, and billing@fourthcoffee.com, and then include the appropriate e-mail addresses on your printed stationery and marketing materials or on applicable pages of your Web site.
Note To view billing and account information or to use advanced administrative features, you must sign in with the e-mail address that you used when you signed up for Office Live Small Business.
When you use separate e-mail addresses for different types of communication, you also give customers confidence that their questions are reaching the correct person. When you answer customer questions quickly, your business earns a reputation as a responsive, customer-focused organization.
Note When you use Outlook Connector, discussed earlier in this article, you can add all of the e-mail addresses you use into Outlook to quickly access them all from the same place, while still keeping them separate and organized.
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Build customer relationships
In addition to traditional account management such as billing and customer support, e-mail can be an easy and inexpensive way to build relationships with your customers and grow your customer base.
For example, offer customers the opportunity to sign up for an e-mail newsletter through a Contact Us form on your Web site. In your newsletter, you can include expert tips, product information, and special offers.
Include pictures, maps, and links in your newsletter, and then activate and use reports to track the effectiveness of those newsletters through link tracking.
Providing helpful information beyond basic customer service establishes you with customers as an expert resource. And periodic communication with customers keeps your business top of mind without being intrusive.
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Stay connected and organized
Office Live Small Business gives you several simple and effective ways to take advantage of everything that e-mail offers. From communicating with co-workers to helping customers, organizing your work, and marketing your company — you can use the power of e-mail to manage many vital areas of your business.
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