Email on Website

<p>Sorry if this is a bit simplistic ............... I'm in the process of creating a site, homepage for my images. My question is can I use a "normal" email address for contact purposes on my site? I don't have use for a smart phone so G mail is not something I want to use yet. <br>

Thanks<br>

<br />Al</p>

<p> </p>

<p>First, no matter which email system you use, you should do something to minimize spam. A simple way with a standard email system is to disguise your email address by embedding it in an image on your webpage. Then the web crawlers won't find it and add you to spam lists.</p>

<p>I'm not sure what you mean by "normal". Your Internet Service Provider probably gave you a cryptic email address: jsmith123@gouging.com. This doesn't look very professional, you may want to consider getting your own domain name. Then your website could be johnsmithphotography.com and your email could be john@johnsmithphotography.com.</p>

<p>Your ISP will normally let you have multiple email addresses, so johnsmithphotography@gouging.com is another option.</p>

 

<p>If you use gmail, it can be used without a smart phone, so I am not sure why you mention smartphones. But johnsmithphotography@gmail.com is not as professional looking as your own domain name. </p>

<p> </p>

<p>Note that whoever is handling your domain registration (say, GoDaddy, etc) may provide email aliasing services for free or very, very cheap. That way you can have<br /><br /> sales@aldurer.com<br /><br />or something similar that - behind the scenes - forwards such email to the mailbox you personally use on a regular basis. That way you're not disclosing your real mailbox to the spam robots.<br /><br />You might also consider a simple contact form on the site. People fill in the blanks like they would when composing an email, and the info is sent to you by the server, at a not-seen-by-the-public email address.<br /><br />I agree with Matthew M, that gmail (a very, very useful free tool) certainly <em>can</em> be used on a smartphone, but it very useful regardless. I use it all day long with a standard desktop web browser as well as multiple portable devices. Its primary virtue is that it's not tied to your ISP. So, if you change carriers from, say, Comcast to Verizon, you experience no fuss.<br /><br />But the point about professional appearances definitely matters. It's so cheap to have mail@yourowndomainname.com (at least forwarding, if nothing else) that it's a real marketing/credibility mis-step to show anything else on business cards, invoices, and a web presence.</p>

<p>I recently added a form to my contact page. That way I can use my gmail without posting it for all the world to send me viagra deals.</p>

<p>Mathew and Matt,</p>

<p>Thanks for your swift replies. Very good of you both. <br>

Yes I have a domain name already and the site is probably built okay now except I need to set up a contact eMail. <br>

And ....... sales@aldurer.com ........... was roughly the kind of thing I had in mind. <br>

What I call "normal" is my home/house mail address which I clearly don't want to use on my site. I thought that as I was going to use it attached to a domain name I would have to use a "special" sort of email. Maybe G mail is the way for me to go ........ (I'd thought you could only use that with a smart phone so it's good to hear I can use it without one.) I would like to receive mail from and reply to that same address. I hadn't thought of spam robots so I guess I'll have think of that too. <br>

<br />Al</p>

<p>Thanks Hugh ................. yes the form, also mentioned by Matt, sounds like the way to go. But how is the form connected to the email on the site.<br>

Sorry all this is rocket science to an old geezer like me.<br>

<br />Best <br>

al</p>

<p>Getting the form to collect the filled-in data and, behind the scenes, have it spit out an email to you ... that's what we call "server-side" activity. The way a particular web server handles that depends on the platform. Do you know what sort of server you're on? Is it a Linux/Apache-based server? A Windows/IIS-based server? <br /><br />Your hosting company's support pages (or support people) will certainly have some guidance on how to do this most-common of things. They may even have a canned mailing script you can use. There are many copy/paste form scripts out there, but you have to know what sort of server software is running the web site in order to know what to bolt onto it for this sort of thing. I don't mean to trivialize the effort involved, as it might be a little daunting for someone who doesn't do this all day long. But you're not having to re-invent the wheel to get a contact form to work - it's likely your hosting shop has a template and script that will just need a little prettying up for you.</p>

<p>Matt many thanks again for your time and trouble. <br>

Okay I'll look into what your saying ............... I think my hosting company is my domain name people ......... I'll spend some time looking at what they offer there.<br>

Thanks again .......... i'll report back when I've sorted something out.<br>

best <br>

Al</p>

<p>I intentionally run a lot of my mail from other addresses forwarded through gmail, including mail collected by my home ISP and from my site domain name connected address, because gmail does a really fabulous job of sorting out spam. I NEVER get spam in my gmail box, and when I check the gmail spam box I find it has improperly grabbed "real" mail only once or twice in the past several years.<br>

On the other hand, the worst? Microsoft's products are horrible. They can't even recognize as spam mail that's been sent spoofing Microsoft or Hotmail's staff--I get mail all the time from "Hotmail support" and other such names demanding my address, password, etc.</p>

<p>Forms are not recommended unless it uses a captcha. The 'bots will find it and spam it.<br>

If you get a domain name, you pretty much get at least one email address free.<br>

gmail is a service accessible through a web browser. As stated, it has nothing to do specifically with smartphones.<br>

Agree that gmail does a good job of filtering spam, but it's not perfect (no provider is). I get some spam now, but thankfully not a lot.<br>

I would encourage you to stay away from "sales@aldurer.com" as it comes off as pretentious. Suggest al@aldurer.com, or "al at aldurer dot com" (I'm not aware of 'bots being able to interpret this as a valid email address).</p>

<p>Michael & Gary thanks for responding and for you advice and tips. <br>

Pretentious Moi ..............<br>

I'm hoping that Monday or Tuesday I'll be able to get a clearer idea of what I'll be doing about this. I'll report back when I have set something up. <br>

Hope you go on all right.<br>

<br />Al</p>

 

<p>Here's another way of including an email response area without making the email address itself obvious to spambots and without having to set up forms.</p>

<p>Cut and paste the following html on your Contact page</p>

<p><br /><P><script><br />document.write ("<a href=\"mailto:"+"al"+"@"+"durer."+"com.""+"?subject=Hi Al\" > Get in Touch </a>")<br /></script> </P></p>

<p><br />Include everything from the first < to the last > and all " marks as well. The words in Bold you can replace with whatever you want, to personalise it. So instead of Hi Al you could have Howdy Old Geezer, instead of Get in Touch you could simply have Email me. When you replace these Bold bits they no longer need to be in bold, that's just to show you which bits you can change and still have the html work correctly. But only replace the letters not any punctuation.</p>

<p>Edit:- Okay so Bold doesn't show up. The words in bold should be 1. al 2. durer 3. Hi Al and 4. Get in Touch</p>

<p>Mac,<br>

<br />Thanks very much for this info and html, which I think is some kind of web language. If I put this on my site and don't like it for some reason how do I get rid of it?<br>

As I said above hopefully I'll be looking at this again on Monday or Tuesday.</p>

<p>It's HTML, the language that describes web pages. If you can put this into a page on your site, you will also be able to remove it if you wish.</p>

<p>Al,</p>

<p>Like Gary said, but it sounds from your question that you're using a WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) web editor and not inputting any html yourself. If that's the case when you create a web page or anything on that web page the editor you use writes the HTML for it in the background for you. The website won't work without html it's just that you're not writing it the editor program is. Some (most? all?) web editors allow you to enter html, in addition to just designing by drag and drop methods. You'll need to look at all the menu options or check the Help files to see if yours does.</p>

<p>Once you find a way of adding the html remember exactly where you inserted it and you can return there and delete it if you want (just select and delete and "poof" it's gone) Or delete the page and start it again if you really get into trouble. If it's a dedicated Contact page it won't have much else on it, so you just create a new one.</p>

<p>Have a look at <a href="http://www.thesitewizard.com/html-tutorial/learning-html-vs-using-wysiwyg-web-editors.shtml">http://www.thesitewizard.com/html-tutorial/learning-html-vs-using-wysiwyg-web-editors.shtml</a> for some more info</p>

<p>Mac's suggestion would be my personal choice. Reasons:</p>

<p>- I don't need to know what's going on behind the scene at the ISP, server, or forwarding, etc. I can easily add that html line of code, without having to worry if something should change behind the scene, like when I switch an ISP.</p>

<p>- I already have a gmail account, like robertkkkk@gmail.com, and don't need another one like info@robertkkkk.com. I can keep my robertkkkk@gmail.com on my business card, without having to wonder if I should use info@robertkkkk.com instead. [robertkkkk is for this discussion, hope there is not a real one out there.]</p>

<p>- Using a form would be my second choice. But I dislike using them myself, and seldom do. So why should I expect others to accept it from me? The need to distinguish between required vs optional fields, filling them, and handling the (ofter ridiculous) captcha just bugs the heck out of me. A form will either mean a separate page, or will lengthen an existing one.</p>

<p>- I will use "Email Me" as suggested by Mac, and preceding it with something like "My name is Robert K ...". This will add a personal touch. It will appear on the already existing About page.</p>

<p>Personally I wouldn't code your e-mail address into a Web page or Website in any format because too many people scrape all sorts of stuff from Web pages and especially e-mail addresses. I would recommend using a script (PHP is common) to generate the e-mail through a form on contact Web page to a single purpose e-mail address for this Web page. Thes scripts vary from the simple to the more complex with all sorts of checks and available on-line for free or a small fee.</p>

<p>Thank you for your time and trouble.<br>

Forgive me for the delay in responding. This is because I've spent many many hours setting up a "simple" email and some sort of email forwarding position. This maybe as far as I will/can go. I haven't yet connected this to my page because of this ..........<br>

Mac I'm making inquires about your suggestion on pasting the HTML to my web page support. If they reckon it will work, bearing in mind my lack of competence, I'll probably give it a go. I'll let you know further<br>

<br />Again my thanks to you all.<br>

<br />Al</p>

<p>Mac<br>

I've put your suggestion to the people who are on the company where my site will be and they say that currently they can't do what you suggest ..........but it will be catered for on their next upgrade. <br>

So I'm simply using eMail addresses. I must leave this room.<br>

Thanks everyone for all your help and suggestions<br>

I hope you all go on all right<br>

Al</p>