How do I get the e-mail addresses?

The following are some suggestions from current Constant Contact customers of email marketing.

 I have every employee ask every single customer if they  are on our email list or would like to sign up. If they do the customer is entered in a drawing for a free item or service from the store. I explain that our list is not sold and that they will only receive one email newsletter from us a month. I always put at least 2-3 coupons on the bottom of each mailing and let the customer know that they are worth using every month.
I give each person who signs up 2 coupons (with limited expiration dates) for future purchases. I also gather information (most important part) asking them how they heard about my store which also asks them what types of items they are interested in for the future and what they've purchased from me plus their comments (great for future newsletter quotes too).
I also use the sign up box as a way to get email referrals. If a friend signs up another person (permission based) I reward both customers with a free goodie. They love this.

 I sent out snail mailers to out membership (private country club) showing a sample of the e-news with a form below for sign up. Most members returned form with their payments. Some just sent an email requesting to sign up. I also have links on the membership application, website, signs on the bulletin boards and sign up cards in the Pro Shop. This has gotten 70% of our members signed on. I suggest putting sign up information on any handouts or mailers.  

Activities & Shows:

1. We have a link from our homepage to a signup form
2. We ask every person when they call to buy tickets if they want to be included in our list, where they will be offered special discounts and learn all about what's happening at the playhouse
3. We mention the newsletter in the program, and put the web address there to remind them to sign up.
4. We've mentioned the newsletter during the curtain speeches.
5. For a time, we had someone walking around before the show and during intermission, asking for e-mail addresses, and even had a computer in the lobby people could use to sign up.
6. This year, we had a raffle during each show, and customers only had to write their name and e-mail on the ticket to win (we did inform them they would be signing up for our newsletter, and did not require them to put their e-mail address). This was very successful, bringing in around 1,000 new e-mail addresses.
7. In the near future, we are going to try a 'forward to a friend' contest: for each friend that signs up, they are both entered in a contest to win season tickets.
We use every opportunity to direct people to sign up for our e-blast, and in the 2.5 years we've been using Constant Contact, we are now at nearly 3,000 addresses.

 In the personal staffing Field:

 When a resume is electronically scanned into our database, the email addresses are automatically uploaded to Constant contact on a monthly basis.
For urgent communications we use telephone or email. But to stay in touch long term we use Constant Contact for news/events and "jobs of the month" notices which go out to nearly six thousand or so depending on content. We can fine tune our emails to hone in on specific industries as well using our database.

Internet Sales:

We add customers who have purchased from us to our email list. It's listed in our Privacy Policy that they will receive one email from us after they purchase and if they don't want it again, we will permanently remove them from our list. 90% of our list was built this way.

 
We've had a sign-up box on each page of our website for quite awhile, but I'm also going to add it to our e-mails