Email List Services – How To Choose The Right Provider

Email marketing goes in waves.  Every now and then, we read reports and blogs posts telling us that email is dead and building a solid list is a waste of time.

I have to wholeheartedly disagree.  It doesn’t matter what niche or business you’re in, your prospect and client database is one of your most valuable assets.  In the online world, that database is your list.

After talking to clients over the years, there’s lots of confusion over what’s the best way to build a list, store a list and market to a list.  So, over the next 5 or so days, I’m going to do a post series on building recession-proof lists.

To start, let’s talk about email list services.

An email list service or an email marketing provider is the company that stores and allows you to maintain your list.  They provide you with all the double opt-in protection, autoresponders and the ability to do broadcast messages.

In short, the list service is your one location for email marketing.

Now, some services are dedicated to email lists only.  Others tie in services like CRM software, merchant gateways and shopping carts.

I have three favorite platforms that I have my clients set up on:

Constant Contact

Constant Contact is my first recommendation for people looking to do monthly email newsletters/information bulletins for their clients.  This might be something as simple as event announcements or sales and promotions.

For instance, I’ve done a lot of work with a sewing shop in the last few years.  Things like bringing them online, helping them through social marketing and list building, etc.  i pointed them to Constant Contact because it’s dead simple to use and they really just needed to send out monthly bulletins.  They weren’t doing any hard-core marketing through it.

Aweber

Aweber is my favorite out of the email list services because it’s cheap, allows autoresponders, and has great deliverability rates.

Besides doing all the normal broadcast type stuff, Aweber lets you set up a sequential series of emails that go out at a predetermined time.  For instant, the MarketingHackz Social Media Quick Start Guide is an autoresponder.  Starting the day you sign up, and for the next 9 days, you get a new social marketing lesson in your inbox.  Then, as we add to them, you get them all in succession!

It really does rock.

Deliverability is another factor.  If you were to email your 200 clients out of Outlook, chances are your server will shut you down for a little while.  They do that to avoid spam.  If you email those same clients from Aweber, your emails are almost guaranteed to get there!

If you’re just getting started with email marketing, head over to Aweber and grab an account.  Put the web form in your sidebar with a free download and you’re golden.

InfusionSoft

Now to the big boys.  I love InfusionSoft.  They’re by far my favorite of the email list services.  It has been built from the ground up for serious businesses only.  Up until a short time ago, you had to pay a setup fee to even get an account with them – I think it was $5,000.  Now, there’s no setup.  It’s just the monthly fee.

Infusionsoft has a couple different packages.  Their primary package is email marketing plus CRM integration so you can combine all your customer relationship activites with bulletproof email marketing.

Their next major tier is emai marketing + CRM + shopping carts + merchant gateways.  I’ve used this system for clients and am rolling it out for my own stuff now.

They basically offer all the great things like autoresponders, great deliverability rates, broadcasts, nice templates and all that stuff – but they tie it to CRM software which lets you really get an awesome idea of who your customer really is.  It isn’t just an email address and a name.

Plus their shopping carts rock and can be customized beyond belief.

If you’re serious about building lists and doing good business online – check out Infusionsoft’s free demo.  They’re my choice for high end businesses and projects.

Summary

There are losts of email list services out there.  These are the three that are widely regarded as being the best ones and the ones I’ve used/use.

The main point is that if you haven’t started building your list – you should (as in right now).  It’s the only way your business will truly be recession proof because there are virtually hundreds of ways you can make money if you can get in someone’s email inbox.

Tell me about who your email list is through.  Do you use GetResponse or iContact or one of the other ones?