The
Nitty-Gritty
Guide to Signature Files
To Do:
Include a signature file on every email, every
newsgroup post.
What Is A Signature File?
A signature file is a short text message that
follows the body of your message – in emails or in posts to message
boards, newsgroups and email lists.
It is frowned upon to advertise a product or
service in these forums. If you have a product or service that might
interest the other members of the community, the accepted way to tell
them about it is to put some information in a signature file.
The signature file should not be longer than 50
characters to a line (including spaces). Some email programs, but not
all, break lines at around 50 characters. The best way for you to
determine the look of your sig file, is to introduce your own
line-breaks at fewer than 50 characters.
Examples:
My
signature file currently contains this text:
--
Julie
Duffy
The
21st Century Publishing Update is here!
Articles for authors, small presses and self-publishers.
To
subscribe send an email to: WritePublish@yahoogroups.com
In some email programs it would be chopped up to
look like this:
--
Julie Duffy
www.jdwrite.com
The 21st
Century Publishing Update is here!
Articles for authors, small presses and self-publi
shers.
To
subscribe send an email to: WritePublish@yahoog
roups.com
This renders it unreadable and u-g-l-y! It also
breaks the email address, so that it is no longer a functioning
hyperlink. To avoid this, I forced some line breaks as follows:
--
Julie Duffy
The
21st Century Publishing Update is here!
Articles for authors, small presses,
and self-publishers.
To
subscribe send an email to:
WritePublish@yahoogroups.com
Length
The signature file I just showed you has 9 lines,
including the divider and the blank line. This is really too long. The
signature should not be longer than 4-6 lines in total (including
dividers and blank lines. Any longer and it takes up too much space. Any
longer and no one will read it.
The shorter version of my signature file doesn’t
give people as much information, but gives them the basics: my name, my
web site address, announces my newsletter and gives subscription
information.
It reads:
--
Julie Duffy
www.jdwrite.com
Get
The 21st Century Publishing Update!
email: WritePublish@yahoogroups.com
Focus
For similar reasons you should pitch one thing only
in each signature file. If you have three books on similar topics, OK.
Otherwise, create different signature files for different audiences. If
you try to advertise everything you do, I blip over your sig file
without taking anything in.
Format
When giving a web address, include ‘http://’
before the ‘www’ part. This will allow older email programs to
identify and represent the address as a hyperlink. This, in turn, allows
readers to click on the link. Otherwise they will have to copy and paste
or, heaven forbid, retype the URL, misspelling and messing up as they
go. Don’t make people work hard to find your site. Likewise, make sure
that email addresses do not flow over line-breaks.
Don’t get too fancy – especially if you are
posting to newsgroups or email lists. ASCII art can be cute when I’m
in the mood but appended to every email you send that rabbit drawn
entirely in Xs and Os starts to bring out the Elmer Fudd in me.
Always remember that different people look at email
in different formats. Me? I always read my email in Plain Text, because
I hate what some people do with backgrounds and fonts. Other people have
their email program set up to boost the font-size on all incoming mail.
Therefore, do not spend too much time trying to lay words precisely
across the page, using spaces or tabs. It may not look the way you
intended when it arrives in someone else’s inbox.
What
should go in your Sig File?
If you are an author promoting a book your
signature file should contain:
