timhindes.com

Recently I’ve been doing some online research for projects. If a website has content that seems to have value, I’ll normally check to see if they have a newsletter that will benefit me in the future as a way to stay in contact with the site (in addition to RSS feeds). I subscribe to a lot of enewsletters. I don’t read them all as they come in, but I do glance at them and file them appropriately (if only I could keep all aspects of my life that organized). Typically, I have all of these enewsletters and correspondence set up to go to my personal e-mail address. Due to corporate e-mail retention policies, I found it easier to manage in my personal account for archival purposes.

Recently, I was on a marketing website which required a corporate e-mail address to allow me to sign up. Required?! By restricting to “corporate only,” this company was ignoring large portions of its potential client base, or, at the very least, partners for projects. It’s only an e-mail newsletter, after all. Why not expose your brand to as many people out there willing to accept it?

Here’s who they are neglecting:

1. Freelance community – Well connected individuals who have the ability to forge and develop new partnerships.
2. Entrepreneurial community – Although they often have not established “corporate” e-mail addresses, these are regional movers-and-shakers.
3. Business community – Just because they may prefer to give their personal e-mail, doesn’t mean they don’t have professional jobs. The possibilities are endless.

With filtering features available in e-mail marketing software across the board, there’s no viable reason I can think of for a company to restrict e-mail addresses.

Don’t restrict your e-mail acquisition fields. You may be neglecting a large segment of your audience. You never know where your next lead will come from.