Mail or Email

directsound said:

I agree it is more personable but by that time you have already made the connection and they like you as they are booking with you . You can mention that mail is more preferred but in this time of new technology email just makes more science and its just a matter of a technology make it easier and the since of going GREEN save a few trees and stamps

MM

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I did snail mail until a bride who promised she wanted to book never came thru and I'd passed up 2 other chances to sell the date. After that, I said forget it, first-come-first-served. The proposal gets emailed, and it has a link to a booking screen. The contract gets filled out, generated online (with copies going to me and them), and then it takes them to paypal for the deposit. The whole process takes about 2 minutes and I've gotten great feedback from clients. If they want to use a check, they print it out and send it in, with the understanding that the date can be booked out from under them (and it's happened).

I still send my contracts by snail mail (I get my postage for free anyway)

I only do contracts via mail. Sometimes brides will request it via e-mail and I will then send it out this way. I try to avoid e-mail because the sense of urgency is gone. I've noticed a couple months back I sent out 3 contracts the same day via e-mail. What were the results? It took 3 weeks to get the signed contract back, and the other got lost in the mail (they had to be resent).

IMO, send contract snail mail give the best results. I usually get contracts back within a week - 2 week period. I hope that helps!

food for thought..

Big Dan said:

I too prefer paper for contracts. This way you always have a hard copy. Email just seems less official. Being it's 2010 and a majority of my work is completely online I do almost every via email but do print out long term contracts. If doing a large project I print out all the correspondence so I can reference it from wherever.

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All of our info is done via email and our data base. The prospective bride gets the email, prints it out, signs it and sends it back with a deposit. Done.

Here is my list in order used

1. Fax to them and they mail back with Deposit
2. Email to them they mail back signed with Deposit
3. Mail to them they mail back with Deposit
4. Face to Face, but they come to me. I am not driving 10-75 miles for some idiot that thinks they are funny and don't show up.

I don't accept certified mail returns or anything that I have to sign for. I had one I signed for and the people had wrote on the contract "Paid In Full Cash", then the argument was on and I had to get an attorney.
It would have been cheaper to have done the freebie and called it Lesson Learned.