The Elron Software List comes with a money-back guarantee. Hi-tech mailers can test 5,000 names, and if they are not satisfied they will receive a refund or credit for an additional 5,000 names from a different list managed by Edith Roman Associates Inc., Pearl River, NY.
Elron Software, Cambridge, MA, came up with the guarantee after noticing the history of re-orders of the list of 359,284 direct mail buyers of its firewall, Internet manager and software-monitoring applications. According to Edith Roman, nine out of 10 companies that use the list have re-ordered it.
The Elron list formerly was called “The ON-Technology List” before Elron bought the company in late 1997.
“We think it is a very strong list,'' said Justin Potts, director of marketing at Elron. “There are very few hi-tech lists with the direct mail penetration and the selectivity criteria we have. However narrow or fine their search criteria are, [mailers] can find a segment to target. If you look at who rents the list, it's a who's who of hi-tech.''
Microsoft, America Online, IBM, Windows NT magazine, Sun Microsystems, Sybase and Bell Atlantic are among the 57 hi-tech mailers that have used the list.
John Ganis, senior vice president of list management at Edith Roman, said that although list owners have offered money-back guarantees in the past it is not a common practice. The option of testing names from another list is even more rare. Edith Roman has managed this list since 1992, and Ganis said its selectivity makes it work.
“The beauty of the Elron list is that it costs $195 per thousand and does include selections,'' he said.
