When creating a Marketing List, Act-On gives you several ways to build that list. Each option is valid, but choosing the right approach early helps prevent confusion about where contacts live later on.
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- Marketing Lists can be created from files, existing lists, behaviors, or manual definitions.
- Creating many similar lists makes it harder to track where contacts are stored.
- A centralised list with segments is usually easier to manage long-term.
Understanding your creation options
When you create a new Marketing List, you can choose from several setup options, including:
- Uploading a file of contacts
- Copying the structure or contents of an existing list or segment
- Building a list based on response or activity behavior
- Defining columns manually for future population
These options control how the list is initially built, but they do not change how the list behaves after creation.
Why creation choices matter later
It can be tempting to create new lists for every campaign, region, or variation. Over time, this often leads to uncertainty about:
- Which list contains the most up-to-date version of a contact
- Whether contacts exist in multiple places
- Which list should be used for reporting or automation
As more lists are created, answering simple questions like “Where is this contact stored?” becomes harder.
A more centralised approach
In most cases, it’s easier to manage your data by keeping contacts in a smaller number of primary lists and using segments to handle targeting, filtering, and variation.
This approach makes it clearer where contacts live, reduces duplication, and simplifies long-term maintenance.
What’s next?
If you are creating a new list, follow Getting Started with Marketing Lists to choose the setup option that matches your data source.
If you already have a list and want to target a specific group, consider using segments instead of creating another list.