Ever since the advent of email, there has been a need to gather the email addresses of our clients or potential clients.

Over the years we have come up with various methods from flat out asking for them to all sorts of methods using third party (i.e. you have to pay!) tools.

So, when I received an email from a local REALTOR® recently with an idea that I thought was brilliant, I knew that I needed to share it! (Even though he obviously had my email address in order to send it to me, this method of getting confirmation of addresses is a good idea. If he also snail mailed this to his farm or sphere, it would generate new addresses!)

Here’s the gist of what was said in the email:

Looking for a Holiday Recipe

The *********** Team is excited about the upcoming holiday season, and it got us thinking about some of our favorite holiday recipes. We have our favorites like turkey, ham, mashed potatoes, and lots of desserts, but we want to make some new and fun side dishes too!

Then we were thinking…wouldn’t it be fun to ask all of my friends / family / clients for THEIR favorite recipes? Then we can compile and share them around the holidays!

So, here we are! Asking you to share your favorite holiday recipe! If you have a moment and would like to contribute, we would love for you to send us the recipe. It can be new, old, dessert, drinks, whatever! Feel free to type it out or send us a picture of the recipe if it’s easier.

We can’t wait to share these yummy dishes with you! Please send us your recipes by December 1st.

Once compiled, we will share all the recipes with you in our

************* Team Holiday Cookbook.

So why did I think that this was brilliant? Simple? Who doesn’t want to share a recipe? And this is very timely as well. Getting people to do this does a number of beneficial things for the REALTOR®:

You get verification that the newsletter was opened and action was taken
You get the sender’s email address if they email the recipe, which most will
You get a collection of recipes which you can send to your list (Free Content)
You can use the content in blog posts, social media posts and if you are ambitious even in a book that you could publish on Amazon!

I think the recipe idea is good, but could you come up with other ways around this time of year to ask for email addresses?

Here are a few ideas to get you started: