Email for seniors is not the same as email for the rest of us
[above photo: examples of email delivered using Presto’s pre-formatted email templates]
If you think email for seniors is the same as email for the rest of us, think again. If you are in your forties or fifties and worked in an office, you probably remember “getting the memo” of when electronic mail training would start. I remember saying “E-mail? Who needs that?! Another thing to check in addition to my in-box (the physical one), voice mail, and pager messages. How am I going to get all my work done when I spend most of my day communicating?!”
Well, it was soon thereafter that I realized email allowed me to leverage my work day and delegate tasks to subordinates very efficiently. It allowed me to keep projects moving, regardless of time zone, country or whether project team members were in the office or not. And, once my pager was replaced with a cell phone, then my productivity really went through the roof (whether these tools made for better quality work or a better lifestyle will be the subject of an entirely different blog post).
This is the way most of us see email. Efficient, effective, productive, plus sometimes a hassle and a burden, but indispensible nonetheless. Email has become essential to our lives. Even if email for some is being eschewed by messaging on Facebook, it’s still electronic communications and basically the same thing in a different wrapper. This is the viewpoint most of us have when thinking of email.
And when adult kids think about email for seniors like their parents, they view it from their own experience. “Will it be a hassle?” “What about phishing scams and spam?” “Will they print out hundreds of pieces of paper? That’ll cost a fortune in ink.” “How about identity theft?” Let alone having the patience to be their computer tech.
But this viewpoint is not at all correct when considering email for seniors. Think of the example above when email was new to the office, and those encountering it (like me way back when) started to explore its uses. After the initial imposition to the standard set of office work tools, it became an incredible adventure. Like setting off into the jungle for the first time, although instead of incredible flora and fauna one encountered chain letters, jokes and the occasional inappropriate cartoon.
Just like in those early days, today when someone provides email for seniors, the elders go through the same wide-eyed wonder. Seniors are floored to receive digital photos the same day they were taken. Or when they get a letter from a child across the globe. To them, email is much more like an instantaneous post office than like a replacement for the office memo.
And, as with letters in their sidewalk mailbox, what seniors really want is to receive incoming mail, not to be required to write a response for each as is the custom with email. When a response is required, research has shown seniors are happy to respond back in any of a number of ways: in person, by phone, by mailed letter. Few seniors who use a computerless email solution instead of a computer felt incomplete not being able to respond in kind to each electronic missive they received.
With simple, hassle-free (and low cost) computerless solutions like Presto, email for seniors takes on a whole new meaning which doesn’t need to include the complexity or cost of a PC with Internet service. Bottom line, gifting email for seniors is one of the greatest things a family can do. It will invigorate the senior’s mind, while making it far easier for the rest of the family to stay in touch.