How to say thank you

Home workers might spend a lot of time working alone, but they all have a network of contacts – clients, suppliers, associates, employees, contacts met at networking and Jelly events, the list is surprisingly large when you add them all up.

The point of a network is to help each other out, and if yours is working well, there will be lots of occasions, big and small, when you want to say thank you to someone who has helped you out in some way.

You might be grateful that someone has given you moral support when you were lacking in confidence, told you about their own experiences or put in a good word for you at a difficult time. They might have spent some time sharing their expertise, given you lifts to business events or helped ease you into networking when you thought you were too nervous to go!

Maybe they have given a referral that has resulted in a valuable new connection or new business. You might want to say thank you for their loyal custom or for being a strong advocate of your business and regularly recommending your services to others.

Ways to say thank you

Just as there are many ways people can help you out, there are now many different ways to say thank you. The traditional thank you letter seems to have died a slow death, so if you take the trouble I’ll bet the recipient will be delighted.

Say thank you using a method that fits the favour – we now have email, tweets, Facebook or a blog post to choose from, depending on whether you want to keep it private or publicise your benefactor’s good deed.

And in cases where someone has really made an effort on your behalf, you might want to say thank you by sending flowers, to their home address if you have it, to a workplace or to an event for public presentation. You can even get them sent the same day if you need to say thank you quickly!

However you say thank you, people always appreciate that you have taken the trouble to recognise their efforts. What’s your favourite way to say thank you?