I don't have to buy your product. In fact, I can turn to your competitor(s) at any point before a transaction--or after one--if I'm not satisfied with the customer service you offer. Since customer service requires communicating with customers, it's important you create effective content for all the stages of customer engagement. From the first time customers visit your website to when they send you comments or questions via email, you have the opportunity to make a lasting impression on prospective buyers. If you use an automated email response that doesn't acknowledge you've even read a customer's questions, or if when you do respond, you're short and you don't thank someone for considering your product or service, they're not going to buy anything from you.

You'd think the aforementioned rules of sales engagement would be obvious, but for some online companies, it's clearly not. I was reminded of this recently when I contacted a company about a product that was out of stock on their website, but available for "pre-order." The website offered very little information about how the pre-order process worked. Since I was interested in the product, I sent an email requesting more info (this site had no contact phone number--that should've sent up a red flag for me). After I sent my first email, I received an automated response that in no way answered my question, and didn't even indicate I'd be getting a real response anytime soon. To make matters worse, when I pointed out my question wasn't answered through this form response, I received a reply without a greeting, and only a short, rude note. Needless to say, no matter how much I liked the product, I won't be purchasing it from this online retailer.

The point of this post is to emphasize one simple rule all businesses (small or large) should keep in mind: good content (copy) is a sales tool, and you shouldn't skimp on it when interacting with customers off your website, either via email or even Twitter. This is especially true for small businesses just starting out. Treat customer communications not only as a situation in which you're obligated to answer questions, but as a valuable opportunity to sell your company and make me buy your product.

And for any business owner that thinks customer email interaction is a "waste of time," you might want to consider supplying informative and adequate content on your website to avoid a flood of questions via email later on.