Need advice for getting data

[sangtif]

Hi

Does anyone know how I can access free email list data, especially small or local businesses?

Thank you so much for your help!

 

[InternetMarketingPlatinum]

How about building yourself a double opt in list instead?

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk 2

 

[Adam Loveday]

@sangtif
Just to be clear I am biased on this one due to the nature of our business, however, there are a number of things to consider.

Free email lists, if you can find them, will be largely generic eg: info@, sales@ etc and not personalised. Being non-personal addresses the benefit of using them will be minimal and may even cost you money if the bounce rate is high. Free = no maintenance and onging checking!! In addition there will be no way to target your list to a given business sector, employee size, geographic area etc.

There are services that purport to scour (scrape) the internet for business details however I strongly suggest staying well away from this type of list. You will still have to pay for these lists, however, they are cheap.....and for good reason! As an aggregated source it will likely have been harvested and compiled from online directories - which is usually precluded by the directory owner and so not legal - corporate websites, forums etc. The list will be non-opted in and will likely contain 'seed' or 'honeytrap' addresses which could open you up to legal action should you broadcast to them!! The error (bounce) rate is likely to be high which would put you into 'spamming' territory and again, the response will be zero.

A bona fide business email list is normally researched by the list builder and each individual on the list should have opted-in for marketing communications. This costs money to build and is the reason why opted-in business lists carry a cost. From a good supplier the data will be routinely maintained, non-trading companies and opt-outs removed and additional information held against each individual record: eg SIC code, Industry, Employee Size, Site/Head Office/Branch flags, Landline numbers etc. The cost is normally £150-£180 per 000 records for this type of data and you will get the decision maker name, full company address and landline number if required plus the data can be targeted by industry sectors, employee size etc

I would seriously recommend abandoning the idea of free lists. The last thing you want to do is waste time, effort and money and possibly incur costs on poor, substandard, non-maintained and non-targeted data.

A good business email list can be a quick way to get your message in front of a decision maker that has opted-in for communications and may be open-minded about your product. Follow-up via telephone would increase the chances of success.

There are other ways to build lists via SEO and I'm sure somebody here would be able to add to this further. The downside is that it could take time to achieve an organically built list.

I would favor considering and testing both Lists and SEO, initially on a small scale, since both approaches actually compliment each other nicely. You can then refine your approach based on results from both avenues.

Warm regards
Adam

Regards
Adam

 

[HarveyH]

Hi Sangif,

I understand your frustration in trying to get together lists of business that may be interested in your products.

We have a software launching next week that will do exactly what you are after.

if this is something that you are looking for you can sign up at mlsuite.net

 

[Rafael]

Hi

Does anyone know how I can access free email list data, especially small or local businesses?

Thank you so much for your help!

Hi Sangtif

There is a system I have used personally that has seen me the top performer in every role I have undertaken, unfortunately and much to my frustration the majority of businesses aren't able to use it 'across the board' as a result of poor recruitment and/or training and/or poor systems and/or what I view as poor/antiquated working practices that have fundamentally flawed processes.

The system relies on recruiting the right people in the first instance, who are incredibly articulate, focused, driven to succeed and above all else professional.

To explain this a little further and the major problem being quality of training and recruitment, my system relies on the following:

-The development of a system to set call backs that each user can easily use and view, put notes on and manage themselves.

-Internet and email access for all users.

Starting with just those two fundamentals I'm sure you can see where the flaws with age old methods still employed and the recruitment of the right people is a major problem. At every sales and marketing business I have worked at the vast majority of the sales people have abused the internet and email access constantly so it isn't difficult to see why the first sales operation I worked for allowed their sales people telephone access only, but for me that is down to poor training and especially recruitment, they work in antiquated ways that are less effective than my process because their recruitment is poor and the people making the decisions of who to appoint and why are stuck in the 'old school' way of working.

How can it be so difficult to instill in people that when you go to work, that's what you're there to do and to find people or train people to conduct themselves in a professional manner in which you don't need a 70's style sales manager cracking a metaphorical whip trying to drive sales by volume of calls only?

I don't believe in mass or blanket calling or e-shots, I don't believe in 'throw enough muck and some will stick' full stop, I believe in professional people using a mixture of internet sourcing to continually build and further enhance an increasingly fantastic database and find the right people to contact through internet sourcing in combination with telephone calling and strategic targeted emailing to make sure the message you wish to get across reaches the right person one way or the other and to continue to use those resources to follow up and thoroughly work each and every lead.

It works because your database, pipeline business, rapport building and understanding of different types of business and the relevance of your product to them and their needs is continually enhanced and at the same time there are always opportunities for a sale or appointment from cold which become easier for each person to close because of the knowledge and skills you/they are building through using best practice in the first instance.

I would start by sourcing the types of business you feel your services are most relevant to and building your database of prospects, contacting each as soon as you have entered/created or amended each record.

 

[PeterCooper]

I agree with Adam - cheap data can be a hassle, BUT if you know what you are doing you can get it cleaned yourself. I bought many databases from £10 on ebay to £1200 from Data Safe and both were nearly as bad.
Together from 200k records we got it cleaned to 8k email addresses but it took nearly 12 months to do it.

 

[Rafael]

I agree with Adam - cheap data can be a hassle, BUT if you know what you are doing you can get it cleaned yourself. I bought many databases from £10 on ebay to £1200 from Data Safe and both were nearly as bad.
Together from 200k records we got it cleaned to 8k email addresses but it took nearly 12 months to do it.

Peter perfectly illustrates my point, if all businesses follow my model of working there will soon by lots of incredibly high volume databases available

 

[crosbtmrkt]

i think it would be a very long winded thing to try and get them free.

 

[PeterCooper]

Rafael this is not a University lecture, this is fast market in 2013. You reach thousands of the customers in few days or you are stack on the forums writing essays.