Data cleansing for telemarketing campaigns
Data cleansing prevents business data decays, which can happen at a frightening rate – 40% a year, according to B2B Marketing magazine. So whilst it can be a lengthy, time-consuming process, data cleansing is vital if your marketing activity is to remain successful.
The old axiom, ‘garbage in, garbage out’ is particularly true in B2B telemarketing. Working with strong, complete and accurate data improves your campaign’s chances of success. Without this you risk wasting resources on piles of returned mail, not to mention falling foul of increasingly stringent regulations. And inaccurately addressed mailings can affect your professional reputation – spelling a key decision-maker’s name incorrectly does not make a great first impression.
Data cleansing - how do I keep my data up-to-date?
So how do you get it right? Data cleansing on a basic level requires involves manually checking each contact in your list to make sure you have the correct contact details and confirm that they are the appropriate decision maker. Good data cleansing will ensure this information is valid and up-to-date, and also presents an opportunity to obtain any secondary level data you need. Contract renewal dates, competitor intelligence and current market ‘pull’ for your service can all be captured through effective data cleansing, giving you a greater understanding of your customers, or potential customers. You might also want to buy some new lead data to add to your existing database.
Start by establishing what you need from your lead data; keep it relevant and user-friendly. Clear objectives keep you focused on what you want to get out of your data, making it more likely to result in greater return on investment.
Think about the information you absolutely must have in order to get to the right people, for example:
· Full name
· Job Title
· Telephone number
· Address (for follow-up mailing)
· Email address
· Website (for research)
Once you have clarified your objectives, work with your UK telemarketing company to establish the most effective way of cleansing your data. A good UK telemarketing company will undertake a data audit to identify the issues, and will offer a range of telemarketing services that may be relevant to you, for example:
· Address and contact detail cleaning
· Flagging goneaways/deceased
· Deduplication
· CTPS cross-checking
Ideally, data cleansing should be an integral part of your B2B telemarketing activity. Integrating this into a direct marketing campaign gives you a valid reason to make the call and give the respondent a good reason to verify their data. Opening this dialogue can provide a much-needed foot in the door.
Whatever you decide, remember: the data cleansing process should be ongoing. An annual check is not enough – data cleansing should be incorporated into all telemarketing activity so that you and your team know that you can trust your intelligence.
Clean data is valuable data; once information loses its validity it loses its value.
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