If you want to build a list of potential customers, you generally have to be a little bit more strategic, and be prepared to invest a little money to "buy" your list. As a rule, people will only be willing to give you access to their inbox if there is something in it for them.

Many options for collecting new contacts exist from running small in store promotions to large scale advertising where entrants go onto your potential customers list.

As an example, a resort might run a promotional campaign in a newspaper, offering the chance to go into the draw for 3 nights accommodation simply by going to their website and signing up for their Accommodation Specials Newsletter.

New and existing customers are the easiest source of email addresses for your database. You should never let a customer leave your place of business without at least asking for their email address. Depending on the nature of your business, this can either be done at the point of sale, or through in store promotions.

Your website can be a lucrative source of email addresses from potential customers. You can do this in a number of ways, including email subscription forms, enquiries forms, order forms and feedback forms.  Always make sure that permission is given before any emails are sent.

For some businesses, the best way to build your list is to go out and ask for email addresses one at a time.

This is particularly true for business-to-business (B2B) markets. Your emphasis here is on getting permission to send information through via email.

This can be done over the phone (either by yourself, sales staff, a professional telemarketer, or in person).

Are we in a recession or is it still coming? Economists and politicians continue to trade opinions, but business people know they are facing an economic downturn. Cost-cutting will be inevitable and unfortunately some of the first cuts seem to be made in marketing. Given the proven profitability of email marketing many companies feel that in this case that conventional slashing of the marketing budget that email should be spared.

Email as a marketing channel offers a distinct set of competitive advantages, not unlike the advantages many businesses will seek in an economic downturn.

Firstly is the accountability of email marketing. Email is considered the most measurable of all marketing channels.  You should be able to justify any investment with hard revenue and profits generated. Email results generally deliver an immediate return on investment.  Send today and view the results in minutes.

Secondly is email's ability to help you protect your most valuable asset in a downturn economy: loyal customers. As a channel, email offers some technical advantages that enable marketers to send highly targeted and relevant messages. You can craft your email campaigns that are focused on your highest value customers, with content and offers that will keep them coming back for more. Unlike television advertising and print advertsing, email marketing offers more cost effective opportunities to surprise and delight your customers, while at the same time generating some quick sales.

When it comes to low cost, high reward marketing channels, email has no rival. In fact, your goal should be to drive as much of your customer communications to email as possible, no matter what state the economy is in. Email gives you the ability to monitor customer interactions in real time and respond quickly to a need or customer concern. It is the ideal device for driving online revenue.

Always remember that email is a permission based medium. Marketers who "blast" their customers with generic messages will certainly get results, but it is the marketers who send the smartest and most relevant email that will reap the greatest reward: loyal, long term customer relationships. And, if we are indeed in a recession, your most important asset will be the enduring value of that customer loyalty.

About this report
This report shows the current state of the email client market. It serves as the largest ever study of its kind, with data from almost three million email recipients. To run an analysis like this on your own mailing list, look at the Fingerprint service.

Business Data collected from 982,873 email recipients using the Fingerprint analysis tool. The mailing list owners classified their mailing list as mainly business users. This chart shows the top 10 email clients by market share. Compiled 11 September 2008 (revised 15 September 2008).

Consumer Data collected from 1,963,046 email recipients using the Fingerprint analysis tool. The mailing list owners classified their mailing list as mainly consumer users. This chart shows the top 10 email clients by market share. Compiled 11 September 2008 (revised 15 September 2008).

Caveats
Email clients are recorded when images are loaded within an email. Some email clients block external images, or are not capable of displaying HTML email. That includes non-current models of Blackberry, and other mobile devices unable to view HTML email. As a result these are not tracked and do not appear in the report.
 
Further to that, the report only shows the top 10 email clients we have detected. In total Litmus can detect over 3,000 different clients. Because of this diversity Litmus recommends analysing your own mailing lists to gain the most accurate information, since results can vary greatly depending on your lists' demographics.