You got 'em, dead in your sights. They're eager to sign up for your email list. (Yeah, they actually want to get information from you!) The click is made and then....they stop. All they wanted was to supply you with an email, but instead, they're looking at a form worthy of governmental consideration.
Name, address, home number, work number, mobile number, bag phone number, AOL IM, Yahoo IM, favorite band, favorite station, favorite team. Sure, you don't make it required that all the fields are filled in, but while they're there, right? It gets so bad that the person can't even find where to enter in their email address, the only reason they clicked to begin with. The browser window closes and you've lost a potential addition to your list because you got greedy.
You're not alone, but you can fix TMI-tis, diagnosed by Dr. Nason as Too Much Information-itis. It's happened to me and I want to help you cure your email marketing ills.
Let's get to the root of what you're trying to do: collect emails from someone that wants to stay in contact with your company or client. They've engaged by opting to give you their address, so you've already achieved your goal. Stop right there. While it's tempting to think that you might as well ask them everything possible while they're at this critical juncture, ask yourself what you're going to do with it. Is there a purpose to getting all that information or are you getting it "just because"? If you hesitate with answering this question at all, then you should be getting just the basics: first/last name, email and zip code. This allows to you know who the email owner is, how to contact them and where they're from, aka the basics.
If the answer is that you really need that info, then I'd suggest going about it a different way. Most times, you will probably get that desired info just by them purchasing something or taking another course of action with your business. There are ways to get what you want without overwhelming the end user and losing them before they bite the hook.
And please, please, please don't make people choose a username/password to get emails. I subscribe to a few arena mailing lists to get information on concerts and two of them required me to create a username/password. Why? I'm not that concerned about someone hacking into my account and changing my music preferences from Tool to Toby Keith, so why should they? I don't understand why marketers make it so difficult sometimes for people to get their information.
The golden rule: Keep A Simple System (K.A.S.S.). Do whatever it takes to get them in your database with as little difficulity as possible and then, get the rest of the information the old-fashioned way: by providing a service.