We are often asked to deliver emails as part of our business lists and inevitably we end up having a discussion about role-based business emails and their place in our data as a legitimate method of contacting a business.
When you’re wanting to run a cold email marketing campaign, it might seem obvious to only want to email to personal emails. The logic is very basic here – a personal email goes to a specific person. However the not so obvious thing is that a lot of smaller businesses don’t have personal emails.
The reality on the market in NZ is that because so many businesses are small and have less than 5 staff, it’s very common for a generic email address to be used by the owner. In many businesses with 5 staff or less, a generic email is used as the main business email. And as the vast majority of companies in NZ have 5 or less staff. So we are faced with a world where role-based emails must be used for marketing purposes.
This isn’t to say that every small company uses a role-based email as the main email. It’s simply pointing out the fact that there is a large percentage where this is the case. And it’s a percentage that is simply too big to discount.
Unfortunately companies like Mailchimp have chosen to take a hard stance against these types of email addresses. Mailchimp will reject any email you try to import if it’s a generic or role-based one, and that gets very frustrating if you have clients who may have been purchasing for years from you using an info@ email. Fortunately not all companies are so short-sighted and there are other email marketing programs which will let you add in generic emails for your campaigns.
So the next time you consider purchasing an email list, reconsider discounting role-based emails. And if you’re not quite sure where to begin – drop us a line or give us a call. We’re in a privileged spot to see what companies are doing and what is working. And we’re happy to share this knowledge with you before you plow money into emails that might not even work for you.
