Home exchanging has tremendous potential for creating goodwill among people throughout the world and, in keeping with this philosophy, we believe that courtesy requires that you acknowledge each offer you receive, irrespective of whether or not you intend to explore the proposal.

Members who report low response rates to their offers do so with frustration because they tend to assume that that the recipient has deliberately ignored them. Whilst it is inevitable that some members are better than others at following the request to respond to all offers, there are other contributory factors that can influence response rates. Many of these can be overcome and the following hints are aimed at increasing response rates and making exchange agreements easier to reach.

Spam
In an effort to combat spam, many internet service providers (ISPs), especially free ones such as Hotmail, assume emails from unrecognised sources (i.e. those not in a list of contacts) to be spam and direct them to a Junk Folder before deleting them a few days later. Experience tells us that many email account holders are unaware of this filter, which means that they are oblivious to many of the exchange offers that they may have been sent.

• Hotmail & others: Check your email reader settings. It may be automatically deleting messages it identifies as spam which erroneously includes email from the homelink.org server. Look for a folder where deleted or trash mail is kept. The cure is to specifically enable the homelink.org domain.
• AOL users: Be sure that you are not blocking email from the Internet. The absolute cure is to enable mail from the domain "homelink.org."

Offers
Members have reported a tendency to be less responsive to emails that appear as though they have been sent in bulk, so avoid salutations like "Dear HomeLinker". Instead, personalise e-mail messages with your fellow member's name(s) and include the word 'HomeLink' somewhere in the subject line to signify a bona fide message and so help avoid it being discarded as spam.

Indiscriminate targeting can also prompt low response rates so it is often worthwhile to refine your searches so that you do not send an offer of a two-bed apartment to an ideally-located family of six.
All initial email offers are sent via our website and a link to your on-line listing is added automatically so it is very convenient for your recipient to view your details. For this reason, we recommend that you spend time on making your on-line listing as appealing as possible and making it as quick and easy as possible for your intended partner to say “yes” to your offer. Useful tips include:

• Include the addresses of relevant websites (e.g. local tourist boards)
• Help travel planning by mentioning likely travel options (e.g. time and/or distance from airports, seaports, channel tunnel). This is more important for holidays of a relatively short duration.
• Consider the profile of your likely exchange partner and develop your on-line listing accordingly. For example, families with school-aged children may be more inclined towards adventure parks than retired couples.
• HomeLink members tend to be adventurous and the primary criteria tends to be location so put yourself in the shoes of an adventurer and consider the attractions that can be experienced within your catchment area. Much of the UK has a unique history, and that can often be a source of appealing
  

You might find that a politely requested deadline helps and consider adding a request to the detail of your offer: "May we ask you to express any possible interest in this proposal by (date), after which we will assume our exchange offer does not fit in with your plans". We suggest that a standard response time of 3-4 weeks is reasonable, given that the recipient has to read your email and may like to research the offer (e.g. flights, climate, local attractions) before providing a considered response.

Responses
We request that you respond to all offers from HomeLink members, irrespective of whether you are interested in the exchange that is being offered. Even a brief email will suffice, stating simply:

"Thank you for your offer, but exchanging to _______ is not in our plans for this year."

If the exchange offer that you receive is attractive to you, it is worth progressing towards completion of a formal Home Exchange Agreement Form with a sense of urgency. Members naturally send and receive multiple offers and so it is inevitable that negotiations occasionally cease prior to an agreement as either party can receive an appealing offer at any time. HomeLink members clearly recognise that cancellation of a formal agreement is a cardinal sin as it is a very rare event. Therefore, a prompt agreement can enable partners to focus on researching travel costs and other details with confidence.

If the signals you are receiving from a potential exchange partner are encouraging, you might consider replacing latter-stage emails with telephone calls as it is often more time-efficient to talk than write and you get to know your partners a little better. Email can still be used to lay out the proposed items for discussion and to detail the agreements that have been reached.