What Your Personal E-mail Address Says About You

When you work for an organization, an e-mail address is provided to you and you don’t have any choice in the matter. It doesn’t matter if that e-mail address dumps real e-mail in the spam folder and allows spam to sail into your inbox. You’re stuck with it. A personal e-mail address, or the e-mail address you use when you work for yourself, however, isn’t so cut and dry. I used to think that no one cared about your e-mail address unless it was something inappropriate or tacky like drunkatnoon@yahoo.com. But now I’m not so sure.

Lately, the blogosphere has been murmuring that e-mail addresses from Hotmail and Yahoo are so 2003. Well, in fact, I’ve had my Hotmail address since 1999, and I’m quite attached to it. I’ve tried numerous times to switch over permanently to Gmail or my domain at AlexandraLevit.com, and I just can’t do it. But I wonder if my sentimentality is hurting my reputation. If Hotmail is considered behind the times, does this mean that people think I’m technologically challenged? Does failing to use an e-mail address associated with my spiffy-looking website mean that potential clients are not taking my business as seriously?
Several personal branding experts have weighed in on this recently, including my friend Dan Schawbel, who agreed that Hotmail and Yahoo e-mail addresses are dated. “You really need to get Gmail or at least use yourname@yourdomainname.com. Gmail allows you to talk directly with other people and your domain name is more professional.”
I would really love to hear what you guys think. For those who are job hunting or networking, do contacts really stop and think about where their e-mail comes from, and will it hurt their chances if Gmail just doesn’t float their boat? Is this enough of an issue that I should say goodbye to Hotmail forever?
Article by Alexandra Levit and courtesy of Water Cooler Wisdom blog.

Originally posted by Candice A