Image credit Avard Woolaver 

I was recently reminded what a gesture of a written thank you could mean to another person. Thank you notes aren’t anything new to me, my Mom firmly reminded my brother and I that we should write a thank you note after we received a gift.  She direction on a thank you letter and provided stationary to complete the task. There were many thank you notes I and my brother penned at the kitchen table or, individually are our desks. Most often these thank you notes were for birthday or, other occasion gifts that we received. Years after this experience I revived the thank you while I was an employee of Restoration Hardware. I wrote a fair share of thank you notes during my time at Resto. I even went so far as to write a short article for “The Tool” the company’s newsletter, on the topic of a thank you note. It was in this brief article I implored our associates to carve time out of their busy days to jot off a note (on company supplied cards) to a customer with whom they had met and probably transacted some business. Even if it wasn’t acknowledged by the customer, I saw it as an important point of differentiation. The thank you note continued to follow me around as I got a little bit older.

In the last few years, I have left thank you notes on the back of receipts when my Wife or, I include a tip for good service. It’s just a quick few words that takes a minute or two and I usually sign it from all of the family. It gives me a chance to tell the server/waiter/tress what I appreciated about the experience in addition to the monetary reward. I don’t know if they like it, read it or even care about it but, it seems to me to be good manners at the very least.

This week I was reminded about the power of a thank you. I signed up for an email newsletter written by Bryan Eisenberg and his staff. Bryan is an industry leading consultant in online conversion optimization. Don’t know what online conversion optimization means? Think of a time you had a horrible online checkout… that’s what Bryan and his company fix.

At any rate, after I signed up I received a thank you email message and welcome to the newsletter. In addition, Bryan includes a PDF with some tips/strategies on conversion optimization for FREE. I perceived some value in the information and didn’t think twice about jotting off a quick thank you message. I didn’t really expect anything from it but, minutes later, I received an email from Bryan personally thanking me for the message. (I was amazed). Who would think that a pro as well known and busy as Bryan had time to answer me? But, it turns out he’s been handling the email box duties since they started publishing in the 90s and I was the first to thank them for the download.

So, if it’s for business transacted, gifts received or great service rendered there seems to still be room for a thank you even today. Thank You for reading.