State of the Co-ops ’07

Prefer Network

A division of direct marketeting service firm CMS Direct, Prefer Network’s new FreeMax 8 focuses on address hygiene and data modeling on a post-merge, prebindery basis. It’s made up of two crucial elements: proprietary change of address and preferred data modeling.

Prefer General Manager Bill Luth says that Americans’ mobility can wreak havoc on catalogers. “Today, something like 800,000 Americans move every week. Only 70 percent of them actually fill out a change-of-address form. Because of the matching logic that Prefer uses, only some 70 percent of the people who’ve filled out the form actually get matched up against the mailing list. Thus, there are 400,000 movers not identified on mailing lists every week.”