How to find Mac owners in my county?

July 14, 2006 9:45 PM

I want to expand my business by sending out a postcard to Macintosh owners in my county. How can I get their addresses?

I heard about an independent Porsche garage that expanded their mailing list (and business) by buying a list of registered Porsche owners from the State Department of Motor Vehicles.

I essentially want to do the same thing for Macintosh owners in my county.

Now, there's obviously no state-run department for computer registration. Most macs are 'registered' with Apple in some form or another, but I doubt Apple is renting/licensing/selling that list to nobodys like me.

Then I thought of magazine subscriptions. What about getting a list of MacWorld, MacAddict, MacHome, etc. subscriber addresses? How would I go about that? This seems far more likely. I get direct mail from tech companies that misspells my name in the same way MacWorld does.

Are there other ways of generating a mailing list that make more sense?

posted by Wild_Eep to Work & Money (5 answers total)

I'd start with trade magazines, tradeshows, professional associations and user groups. Perhaps even a local Mac dealer would sell you a list. Visit the websites or send an email. You could even phone. Most should be able to finetune the list to certain regions or zip codes. You could also look at purchasing a list from a professional list service, but I think you're going to get more targeted results from the above.

Doing your first direct mail campaign can be fairly complicated. You need to build a plan for the campaign, select messages, choose a target market, research mailing lists, find an appropriate medium, find incentives, do graphic design, write copy, make sure you meet mailing standards, organize the mail out, arrange for follow up, track responses, and the like. You may want to consider working with an experienced marketing consultant who can mentor you through this process. (You don't have to stick with them for life. However, you might find that this is a complicated enough process that you'd benefit from someone else mentoring you so you can do it alone later. You can always reuse successful campaigns.) A marketing consultant can also help you determine whether this is the right approach, given your objectives, message and target market. You can also look at just outsourcing part of the campaign, such as by working with a mailing house. If you want to do it yourself, start with a really small campaign that you can easily tweak and try again.
posted by acoutu at 10:05 PM on July 14, 2006

For less than the cost of a single regional mailing, you could probably do several ads in TidBITS, which is well known for high return rates. But I'd also check out Mac user groups in your area, and see about presenting or sponsoring events (terrific bang for your advertising buck, in my experience).
posted by paulsc at 10:06 PM on July 14, 2006

You could try looking at ads in trade publications (as acoutu mentioned). I subscribed to a few free trade publications for mail-order/catalogue sales. I didn't realize they would be largely worthless publications (embarrassingly poor writing/editing with suspect endorsements). But there are many ads offering to sell targeted lists, all reading something like "400,000 REI customers with purchases of at least $150" and including demographics. I can't remember the publication name because I throw it out right away, but I'm sure there are tons of them and that they are easy to find.
posted by reeddavid at 12:58 AM on July 15, 2006

I'd advertise locally (even a text-only classifieds ad) before I'd direct mail. For me, unsolicited commercial mail goes directly into the trash (wasting money, gas, paper) and I make a mental note not to do business with that company. You will alienate some of your potential customers.
posted by D.C. at 1:14 AM on July 15, 2006

Seconding D.C.'s advice about avoiding direct mailing.

Mac folks tend to already be on alert for Mac-related stuff so if you can do some local/regional low-key print advertising that will likely help you. Also, if you have a web site then try to boost your search engine presence locally and then offer a prominent opt-in mailing list link on your site.

When I was doing house-call Mac maintenance/evangelism (the Jehova's Witnesses couldn't hold a candle to me) a couple of years ago in my city I advertised in community newspapers and after a while word of mouth had me scrambling to keep up with demand.
posted by persona non grata at 8:41 AM on July 15, 2006