Improve Holiday Response Rates With Accurate Data Quality

Retailers everywhere are looking to reach prospects and customers to ensure their products end up under the tree this year. There are many different philosophies on how to achieve this goal, but one consistent requirement is accurate contact data. A recent Experian QAS survey found that 99 percent of respondents waste budget on inaccurate contact data, hurting operational efficiency and communication effectiveness, especially during the holiday rush.

How can retailers quickly fix their data during the busy holiday shopping season? First, stress the importance of collecting accurate contact data to your staff. Let them know how inaccurate information influences the success of marketing campaigns. Furthermore, look at creating measureable metrics to incentivize your staff to collect information more accurately. It's important to get the right contact information to enable communication not just throughout the holiday season, but year-round.

Next, run your contact data through back-office cleansing software before any large campaign. These tools standardize information, eliminating abbreviations and misspellings. While this process won't correct all errors, it will correct a good deal of information and automatically increase your reach to your target audience. This cleanse can work for many types of contact data, so don't be afraid to try to clean up email addresses as well.

These practices are two quick wins that can be implemented during the busy holiday season to try to correct inaccurate information before the shopping boom fades away. Remember, the more relevant communications that reach consumers, the higher conversion rates will climb for given campaigns. It's one simple concept that can help retailers in their drive for success this holiday season.

Beatriz Santin is director of marketing and product at Experian QAS North American, where she's responsible for all product, marketing and teleprospecting activities. Beatriz can be reached at beatriz.santin@qas.com.