Renting or buying lists of emails

The #1 question I am asked by clients is: "Dom, can you get me a list of emails?".

(If I had £1 for every time, etc, etc...) This is a hangover from DM (Direct Mail) where list brokers rent or sell lists of names and postal addresses by the million every day. So why not emails too? A reasonable request, surely?

BUT... and it's a big BUT... it's not the same for emails. You can't simply get hold of a list of emails like that.

You can't put the e-mail genie back in the bottle.
Once a list of emails is rented/used/forwarded/abused, it quickly becomes useless. Thanks to SPAM.

You can't, but just imagine you could get your hands on your dream list of emails for all purchasing officers in UK companies over 25 employees. You would send them your marketing email selling your widgets, but a peculiar thing would happen. A large percentage of emails would be undelivered or never opened, as if the list was really old. You would get a very poor return.

• Think about it: that list would have been rented out and used a hundred times that week. People on that list will have had over a hundred SPAMs (of which yours is just one) and a significant proportion may eventually get a new email address.
• You will also get a backlash because email is easier for Mr Angry to reply to than DM - that will tie you up for days.
  
• You may even get your servers blacklisted.
  

Once a list of emails is out there it is quickly rendered useless by over-use, and you can't always be sure that they have all given their permission. You can't just rent or buy lists of emails. Emails are not like DM lists. Different rules apply.

There are 3rd party lists of emails out there.
You can use them but you can't have (or see) them. They are tightly-controlled subscriber lists that sit behind managed e-publications or e-bulletins, in which you can rent a space. You send your creative to the publisher and they broadcast it. These can be monthly or weekly. See eMedia. (This is not a cheap option with prices around £1,000+ per issue per week.)

SUMMARY: Build your own list of emails.
This is the most cost-effective method. Start today and build a permission list of prospect emails of people who are interested in what you have to say (and your customers of course). Your list will quickly grow and your response rates will be far higher. This decision pays off handsomely over time, fortunately, as it is the only other option!