Last month, I talked about acquisition in an article asserting that good acquisition is also good customer relationship management. I’d like to say more about that this month, as Q1 of 2013 will be upon us sooner than anyone ever thinks, and starting the new year thinking about new-customer acquisition is the best way to set you up for the best CRM ever. Here’s something that you might not expect to hear: CRM is—or at least can be—all about lists. We all have a tendency to think of lists in terms of numbers. We want people on our lists to engage, to subscribe, to convert, to repeat purchases; but in the process, we sometimes lose sight of the first part of that statement—the fact that they are people. Your lists aren’t just numbers: your lists are your customers, the people you’re here to serve, the people you’d like to see become your very best customers. I subscribe to a number of internet discussion forums relating to e-marketing, and I’m sometimes amused by the vehemence with which marketers defend their own particular favorite methods and ideas: “Always put an exclamation mark in a subject line!” “Never put an exclamation mark in a subject line!” … and so on. At the base of these arguments, though, is a simple fact: marketers don’t know what works. And the reason that they don’t know what works is that they don’t know their customers. And the kernel of great CRM lies in that simple fact: marketers need to know their customers. Whether or not an exclamation mark works in a subject line doesn’t depend on you: it depends on the people who will be reading and responding—or not responding—to it. And you get to know your customers through the actions they take on your email lists. So once again we’re back to my primary assertion: that good CRM is absolutely dependent on good acquisition. Knowing your customers begins with knowing that your lists have been vetted and verified, and that they contain names of people who really want to hear from you. Size matters, but when it comes to email lists, quality matters even more. The winners this holiday season are the marketers with the best lists. And you know you have a great email list when: