If you are thinking about buying a marketing list or you’re wondering why that list you bought has failed to generate the results you need, this post is just for you!
Building a list or buying a list?
Photo: Goynang
If you want to market your services or products effectively, permission is extremely important. If we have permission to connect with someone, who wants to hear what we have to say, they are massively more likely to develop the right kind of relationship with us.
For example, if you subscribe to this blog via email or RSS, you do so because you want to read it. The message is welcomed. Now, compare that to the way you feel when someone sends you unsolicited sales emails. These are usually referred to as spam and people delete them on arrival, almost every time.
Email opt in lists
After writing about the importance of permission in list building (or community building as some enlightened entrepreneurs refer to it), I was asked about so called opt-in lists. People wanted to know if opt-in email lists were worth buying, as a way to by-pass the time it takes to build a permission marketing list.
These opt-in lists are sold by list brokers and database brokers, as ready made lists of people, who have given you permission to market to them, even though they have no idea who you are.
The reality is that opt-in lists are typically of very, very low quality. Here are just a few reasons why I suggest you don’t waste your time or money on them:
- None of the people on that list asked to receive information from you. You are interrupting them. You are creating an inconvenience. Not a great start to your relationship with them.
- Many people are only on these lists by accident. This usually happens when they subscribe to something, download some free software or give their details to a trader, without seeing they needed to tick a box to NOT receive offers from so-called partners.
- People usually use either fake email addresses for these offers or they use an email address, which is just used for junk; so they never check it. It’s worthless to you.
- The people on those lists get a ton of marketing emails from every other person who bought their details. They are the least likely people to be motivated to want to open yet another unsolicited email.
- We have no way of knowing if the email addresses we have bought (or rented) really were opt-in. Many people claim they were added without their consent.
- The people who say “the money is in the list” are 100% wrong! The money is in the relationships you form, with the people you connect with.
Yes, it takes longer to build a permission based list of interested people, but the quality and value of that list is massively greater than the paid alternative. This is one of the great opportunities from content marketing. It allows us to attract people, who ate interested in our subject and then earn their permission to connect with them.
The bottom line: In my experience, the most effective way for you to have a highly valuable email marketing list, is to build it.
Excellent post Jim, I’ve been trying to convince clients recently that these lists are not worth the money you pay and in fact can be detrimental to the business’s reputation, but with none of the eloquence and conviction of your post. I couldn’t agree with you more that its all about building the relationships and not about shortcuts. Thanks for a great post!
[...] you preach the value of permission marketing, yet pester people with your unsolicited [...]
Great post Jim. One thing I would like to add is that a great way to build your e-list is to offer something free like a white paper or special report to entice web visitors to sign up. It’s still a great way to build relationships with your prospects.
[...] because we can add people to email lists without their permission and send them emails they never asked for, doesn’t mean we [...]