How do I collect email addresses from my clients?

DVMs and Practice Managers ask me this question all the time. Usually in frustration I’m told:

“We’ve tried it and we can’t get email addresses.”
“Our clients don’t want us to email them.”
“The staff feel awkward asking for email addresses.”

All of these statements are true if you understand the context in which many of us are asking for and collecting email addresses.

I want to suggest that thinking a bit about why, when and where we ask and who does the asking makes a lot of difference. In fact I know some practices that report that greater than 95% of people they ask will share their email addresses. So I thought I’d lay out the two ways that I’ve come to understand that clinics try and collect email addresses.

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