Our reply

Considering that you are about to contact strangers 'out-of-the-blue', this gets you into a touchy area, be careful. Unsolicited e-mail (junk e-mail) can be a great nuisance to recipients. If you've been on the internet any length of time, you have received some yourself. It's much worse than junk snail-mail, and twice as annoying. It can jam up one's communication processes, especially for someone with a high profile who gets a lot of e-mail. If you do that to people, you will lose business (and deservedly so!)

Spamming is sending the same message to hundreds, thousands of people, without considering the relevance - a rude and thoughtless act. But most businesses need to contact strangers, unsolicited. What to do? To a great extent, business people accept that businesses need to contact strangers. "Just don't annoy me in the process," they say.

A one-line message to a narrowly defined list is Okay.

How about--

"We are Moda International Imports - Northwest USA. We are developing a list of contacts in (...). Please e-mail if you would like to exchange details.
Michael Sefiane ([email protected])"

See how short it can be. Interested parties will reply: disinterested ones will not have been inconvenienced.

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>Also I would like to know the best way to let someone know I am not interested in or do not
>have the time, in a polite way, to do business with them.
>-------------------------

Two ways to approach this-

1. The message to you is unsolicited and clearly widely circulated. You could just not reply. Or, a simple "No thanks" if you feel you must reply.

2. The message is clearly to you, specifically, and a reply is required. A long drawn-out explanation/excuse is unneccesary. All your correspondent wants to know is "Yes" or "No". But you want to say it as politely as possible. How about --

"Thanks for giving us the opportunity, but conditions are that we cannot, at this time."

That leaves it open for you, in the future, if you change your mind. Times change, conditions change - and you may be glad of that contact one day.

THEME 4. NEGOTIATING PROCESS: PROTOCOL ASPECTS