Should You Purchase Email Leads?Should you purchase email leads? Personally, I don’t think it’s a wise business idea. Many people purchase email leads so they can send these folks bulk emails about their offer, products and services. They assume that if they send out enough emails, they will generate sales and make money. Sure, you might make a few sales if you send out millions of random emails, but I think it’s a poor marketing strategy. First and foremost, when you send out mass emails to people who never gave you their permission to do so, you are violating the CAN-SPAM Act. This can lead to huge fines and potentially jail time. That’s the major reason that you shouldn’t blast out emails to random strangers. Another reason you don’t want to send out to bulk emails to people you don’t know is that most of the people are not in your target market. Chances are they have zero interest in what you have to offer. Please realize that most online lead companies will tell you how effective email marketing is. They even write persuasive copy to get you to purchase email leads. I don’t disagree with the effectiveness of email marketing, but I do think that buying leads and emailing strangers is a complete waste of time. Believe me, when I first started online marketing many years ago, I followed this strategy. I purchased 10,000 email leads for $500 and started sending emails to the list. The only thing I got was a bunch of spam complaints, hate emails and unsubcribes. I did not generate one sale or make money. What You Should Do Rather than wasting your money to purchase email leads from a lead company, it’s much wiser to learn how to generate your own leads. Personally, I think it’s more effective to send emails to 100 people that you have a pre-existing relationship with, than send out 100,000 emails to strangers. That’s because most people won’t buy something from someone (or a business) they don’t know. Sure, you have a few rare circumstances where this might happen, but the odds are stacked against you. Here’s what I recommend you do. On your website, blog or capture page, add a form where people can give you their name and email, to sign up for your newsletter. Each week, send out a newsletter, or tip of the week, to your list. Provide helpful tips, coupons, special offers, a thought for the day, and other great information. Be consistent and send out your email each week, on the same day, no matter what. Focus on educating your customer, rather than always trying to sell them something. What to Expect When you follow this advice, a few things will happen. First of all, you will start to build a relationship with your email list. People will enjoy reading your emails and look forward to getting your email each week. Because you communicate often, you will build a relationship with your list. Many of these people will eventually buy your products or services, when the timing is right. Sometimes, it might take a potential customer 1-2 years before they buy your services. But, when the time is right, you can know that they will buy from you, because you keep in touch with them on a regular basis. Other Tips In addition to collecting names and emails on your website, you can also collect them at trade shows, at your office, at community events and other places. Your number one priority should be to consistently add names to your email list each week. Over a period of time, you can have an email list with 10k, 100k or more leads. This database will be your single greatest asset. Whenever you have a sale, special offer, or event, you can send an email to your list and generate lots of sales. Final Thoughts In conclusion, you should not purchase email leads from a lead company. Instead, take the time to build your own email list. Make sure you keep in touch with your email list at least once a month. Always provide valuable information and focus on educating your customer, not selling your customer. Over a period of time, you will build a strong relationship with your email list and you will increase your sales significantly. Remember that most people need to see your offer 10-20 times (minimum) before they will ever respond. Just stay consistent and safeguard your list. It is your greatest business asset.
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