I have one site that gets about 6K/mo highly niche-targeted traffic. It's an ecommerce site and until now i haven't been trying to get email addresses and names from visitors.
i am now ready to offer a chance at a good ($150 retail) raffle prize to get sign ups..
But, i am not sure about:
- what to do with the signups? i don't have a way of monetizing them myself right now.
- how valuable is a list and what do i need to do to make money from it
- are there any legal things to get in place (at sign up or on the site, like in the privacy policy area)
- what data do i need to collect (minimally)? in this case, i will be shipping a physical product to the winner, so i can legit ask for a delivery address.
Thanks,
What is a "list" worth? Hmmm................let's see.............
That really depends on the "quality" and "activity" of the list.
By quality I mean having REAL information vs. the BS that most people put into opt-ins.
By activity I mean how often do people on the list "TAKE ACTION". They do not have to buy something to be active or take action. If you send a message to your list by email, RSS feed, or even Snail Mail and they take a desired action based on those contacts it would be considered activity.
Lists with BS info or no activity are pretty much worthless.
Getting a quality list that is active can be worth more than you can even begin to imagine at this point in your list building endeavors.
You say that you would be unable to do anything money wise at this time with your list. Well here's something to think about until you figure something out, if you can build a list of at least a 1,000 ACTIVE and quality contacts with detailed info (As in demographics and buying habits.) you could join an affiliate network and send offers to that list. Or you could find products or services that would appeal to your list and then do a Joint Venture with the owners of those products or services.
Now, here's the part that isn't talked about too much on the list building subject. (It is always hit on VERY briefly.) YOU ABSOLUTLEY MUST STAY IN TOUCH WITH THAT LIST and offer something of VALUE to them in your contacts. Even if it is just a once a month contact with something like DISCOUNTS on your newest product offering or telling them about a new site you setup that would have info of interest to them to get them to CLICK AND TAKE ACTION.
You want them to get USE TO OPENING your emails and finding something USEFUL and of benefit to "THEM".
You really have to CULTIVATE a good relationship with your list and you MUST weed out those contacts that take no action over a period of time while constantly continuing to build it.
You need to keep a list for each individual product or offer that you promote. Then you need to keep cross referencing them against each other to see who is on multiple lists of yours. These people will be your most active and likely to BUY or TAKE ACTION when you contact them.
As far as the legal stuff, just get an Aweber or iContact account. That should cover most of what could cause you some headaches.
About information to collect, your imagination is the limit of what you can ask for. You can setup a "What of these things interest you the most?" "What of these things have you purchased in the last year?" "What of these things are you looking to purchase in the next year?" "What of these things would you like to learn about?" etc. etc......
Gear the questions to help you find out WHO on the list would be interested in products or offers that you are or will be promoting. So, you need to do some research and planning prior to setting it up.
Back in the mid 80's I was an Insurance Agent. I setup a booth at a business fair in our hometown with an associate. We offered a $100.00 Publix Grocery gift certificate giveaway. In three days we had over 3,000 entries and over 80% of them filled out EVERY SINGLE line of a 45 line entry form!!! We were astounded!!! Needless to say, we turned that $100 into WELL over 5 figures worth sales over the next 3 months and from then on we did one those giveaways twice a year.
Something we did to help with that 80% so that we eventually got to around 94% completion was to put a DISCLAIMER at the bottom of the form telling the entrants that ONLY "FULLY" completed entries would qualify for being entered into the drawing.
For your giveaway, just be sure to keep RECORDS of the prize and PROOF that someone received it. For anything else that you may be concerned about,
CONTACT A BUSINESS ATTORNEY!!!
The bottom line is that lists can be great if done correctly. It does take TIME and EFFORT to build and MAINTAIN a good & profitable list. Don't listen to these IDIOTS who say, "Just collect emails and then BLAST THE LIST for TONS of $$$!!"
I'll say it again, it will take TIME AND EFFORT (Sounds like WORK doesn't it? Lulz)
But, your list is "YOURS"!! No one can take it away from you. Google and other SE's can't sandbox it or change your ranking so that those people can't see or find your site/sites.
A List can be instant traffic to your new site or offer if you develop a good relationship with your list and learn how to NOT use cheesy subject lines.
It can be "Cash On Demand". It will take work though and you will have to learn as much as you can about list building and relationship development.
I wish you well in your endeavors. 
