What is the best way to collect emails?

[Nat]

I've got little to no experience with emailing. (I've added pre-written opt-in forms to websites before that went directly to whatever mailer gave me the embedded code.) But I know how important it is to make sure your site is sticky and to grab information about your users, etc etc. @CCarter has also told me/us numerous times to never rely on 3rd parties to manage my data.

I have a https://sendgrid.com/ account, but I haven't ever used it...(yet). If I want to be independent my opt-in form will need to save the email and name to a database I own. Then my database needs to auto-send this information to my mailing provider?

Is there existing software to do this? For where I'm at with things this seems like it might potentially be something to wait until later to do.. cost/benefit/time analysis.

Is there anything wrong with using this tutorial and then just exporting the list to my computer once per week?

 

[enslam]

The key point that was being made was to make sure that you've got a copy of those emails backed and available at all times so that if the worst comes to the worst you've still got your list.

There's a lot of people who will build their list in sendgrid or mailchimp but never take a backup and if / when that service goes down / gets hacked then they've lost a significant asset to their business.

I personally would go directly into sendgrid then setup a script that exports all of the data on a schedule so that I don't need to remember to do it.

 

[Nat]

The key point that was being made was to make sure that you've got a copy of those emails backed and available at all times so that if the worst comes to the worst you've still got your list.

There's a lot of people who will build their list in sendgrid or mailchimp but never take a backup and if / when that service goes down / gets hacked then they've lost a significant asset to their business.

I personally would go directly into sendgrid then setup a script that exports all of the data on a schedule so that I don't need to remember to do it.

Yep, got the key point I'm going to start with this and potentially get something more advanced in the future when it makes more sense.

 

[animalstyle]

Personally I use a form provider that sends entries via API to an email marketing/list management service.

Specifically I use Gravity Forms to send entries to Active Campaign which manages the list, sends automated emails and allows me to send marketing emails. I can and do export my list from Active Campaign regularly. In addition all entries in the forms are stored in the DB on my web server.

There is a cost to all this, but I can't think of an argument against paying for it. Your list is one of your most valuable assets. It's a traffic source of people that by opting in have basically told you "I love what you're doing and want more". Having anything less than an awesome system to manage your list is silly. I consider these costs core expenses just as I would web hosting.