News
 Quick
Tip: Suppressing House Files
by: Anna-Lisa Ulbrich,
circulation and marketing manager, Lenser
Sometimes making sure that you’re not mailing
certain house file records can be just as important
as the ones you do mail. Your complete in-house
“Do
Not Mail” suppression file should be used during
every main merge and, if possible, any incremental
house file suppress records should be added to every
hotline merge.
Ideally, a complete house file suppress file record
should include customer number, name, and address
fields—this should ensure a proper match process
during the
merge/purge. When sending house file
suppress files to your service bureau, make sure
that you are including customers who no longer wish
to receive your catalog, as well as records you’ve
deemed as unmailable – i.e., fraudulent or bad debt
customers.
Caution: Never put the
“Do Not Mail” suppression
files through
NCOALink® or any other
address integrity processing. You should always
maintain the suppression record exactly as the
customer gave it to you. For example, many a good
customer will ask you to suppress their old address
when they move. If you apply an NCOALink
change to this suppression record, you will now be
suppressing the new address of a valued buyer.
Also, make sure that the “Do Not Mail” suppression
file does not include records of those who have only
opted out of your e-mail campaigns. These records
should be mailed a catalog unless the customer
specifically requested to be suppressed from
mailings.
Keep in mind that if your service bureau also
handles your list rental files, you’ll want to make
sure to suppress the “Do Not Share/Do Not Rent”
house file records from the rental files since they
do not want to have their names and addresses rented
or exchanged with other lists or co-op databases.
---Source:
Multichannel Merchant List & Data Strategies Aug.
27, 2007 (www.multichannelmerchant.com). Anna-Lisa
Ulbrich is circulation and marketing manager at
Lenser.
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