For small and midsized businesses everywhere, a well thought out email campaign can dramatically improve sales or traffic numbers. Properly managing and growing a list of targeted leads will be a major component to your long term online marketing strategy. Email isn’t what it once was with the proliferation of blogs, social networks, video casting, etc., but it can still be very effective in increasing conversion and strengthening brand awareness.

So how does one get started? Well there are three options. Create a list, rent a list, or buy one.

Create a List
You can create your own list by harvesting names of people that visit and interact with your site. Names and emails can be captured when users download free content, register for an event, login to a product demo, sign up for a newsletter, etc. And don’t just limit this the online world. Contact info can also be obtained at trade shows. Just be sure to have a clearly visible and easy to follow “terms and conditions” check box when the user submits their info.

Rent a List
Basically when renting a list you do not see the email addresses and a third party handles the actual act of sending the emails. There will be a cost associated for each time you use the list. You can rent lists in a couple different ways. One is to hire a direct marketing company that maintains specialized lists of users. These lists are very granular and can be targeted at specific segments such as females in their 20s that work in accounting. Another option is to contact another business that you know has a list and ask to rent it. For example, a small trade publication has a list of emails for all its subscribers. You can directly contact the publication and ask to rent their list. Remember that not all companies will allow this. Your better off to come up with some sort of co branded marketing campaign in order to get in on someone else’s list.

Buy a List
Buying a list is very similar to renting a list, except that you own it. You will not incur a cost to an external party each time you send it out. Again, you can use the same techniques to purchase as list as you would to rent one. Either work with a direct marketing company or approach other businesses.

I strongly recommend that you work to create your own list. I have always felt that buying a list is kind of sleazy since many times people don’t even know they are on these lists. Of course, there are companies now that only maintain lists of people who have voluntarily submitted information (these people get a small cut of the action as well). When you do develop your own list, don’t ever sell this list to other people or allow your business partners to rent it. I have always found that to be shady. Only use the list for your own purposes and use it with restraint. Don’t be a spammer!