I Got Mail. Review on Tips on MouthShut M2M Service

With a plethora of topics concerned with MouthShut, I realized that people have opinion about practically everything associated with MouthShut. I guess this topic was missing the bus, even when it forms a core part of the community’s survival. So lets put the record straight and start off with a review on the M2M service.

*The Past

I don’t know how or in what form the M2M service was created but I can say for sure that it has served the members well whenever they’ve felt the need to talk and communicate with others. Let’s talk of the times till a few months back. Till then, we just had the M2M text-box on our profile where we could fill in our message and hit the send button and the message would be sent.

*The Present

Then MouthShut decided to make some changes. What resulted is the M2M service we see today. It looks better on the face of it, with the service having a subject line associated with the message and instead of delivering it in our own mailbox MouthShut has created its own mailbox where we can keep a track of all incoming and outgoing M2Ms. The catch is that the messages will be archived only for 2 months. When a new M2M arrives, we see a closed envelope created near our account’s link at the top of the page that we’re viewing. These are good changes and well appreciated by the members(as I have heard).

*The Pitfalls

It has been a grouse of many a members that their M2Ms are not being delivered. I have myself faced this problem. When M2Ms don’t get delivered, people resort to posting comments on other member’s reviews asking did you receive my M2M of yesterday? The expected reply then comes out as No. This makes the member eager to find out the email address of the other members and MouthShut being very strict about the privacy concerns of its members, it does not allow members to reveal their email addresses. Of course, people find a way around it by displaying their email addresses on their profile page.

*The need for M2M service

This community thrives on communication. Whenever a member writes a review, he/she expects it to be read and also expects to get some proper feedback from the members in the form of comments. But then there are times when members try to communicate with M2Ms asking for specific information about the product/service that others have reviewed. It is this thing that makes the use of M2Ms worthwhile. I can give an example myself. Just last week, I received a M2M from a member asking me some information about Ranikhet. I went to his profile, looked through it and realized that he had only just joined MS. Apparently, he had read my review on Ranikhet as a non-member and seeking a clarification from me, he joined MS and sent that M2M to me. I politely replied as soon as I was able to gather the information he was seeking.

Then there are instances where a member has to communicate with another regarding some other aspects or in some cases, to simply talk to each other. This may look a bit far fetched but I recall reading it somewhere on MS itself – there were two members who used to routinely talk to each other through M2Ms because the companies that they worked for had blocked access to their web-based email accounts. To work around it, they created an account on MS and started using the M2M service to great effect.

*Use or Misuse

One constant grouse of female members is that they have often received M2Ms, asking for friendship or ostentatious compliments about their profile pictures or unnecessary compliments about their writing skills hoping to impress them. Is it all really needed to be done? More precisely, can this be curbed? Why should we look at MouthShut to curb it by not delivering such M2Ms, why can’t we stop ourselves from doing it? Is it really that hard?

‘Plz RRC my latest review’

How often have you received such M2Ms? I have received such M2Ms a lot lately, including 3 in one day. I noticed that 2 of them were from new members and 1 was from a star writer. I obliged the new members, went to their profile, looked through the small number of reviews that they have written and RRCed them. I don’t find it wrong that they sent those M2Ms to me. I recall that one day I too was a new member and was in the need of some hits to my reviews. It was in those days that I too sent such M2Ms to existing and popular members. They obliged me and gradually when they started visiting my reviews on a regular basis, I stopped bugging them with those M2Ms. Today I have forged a healthy relationship with them and ensure that I return the favour that they gave me in my early days on MS.

But then I saw the M2M from the star writer. I fail to understand the need for such M2Ms from a star writer. In the past too, I have seen a former star writer sending out such M2Ms in the hope of inviting greater number of hits to their reviews. Does it really help them? All I mean to say is that their picture is displayed on the front page of MouthShut and it gives them the added advantage of being in popular view all the time. People will inevitably read their reviews because they know that the status of being a star writer has its own set of responsibilities and they are expected to write good reviews. By constantly bugging others to read your review, the members are not doing a favour to themselves. There will be times when others will not read their reviews and hit the VU button and leave. This is the wrong way to go about it because you will inevitably lose readers.

The bottom line is that the M2M service is something that must be used in a very delicate way. Proper care must be taken so as not to offend the members. People sending M2Ms must ensure that they don’t write anything abusive in it. Just remember the guideline given by MouthShut that we must attack the topic and not the reviewer. Encouragement is good but sending out unsolicited M2Ms is something that should be avoided at all costs.