Saving Profit by Using Advanced List Hygiene

• Set up tests for new and old NCOA and PCOA addresses (zero to 12 months NCOA; zero to 12 months PCOA; 13 months to 24 months NCOA; 13 months to 24 months PCOA; 25 months-plus NCOA; 25 months-plus PCOA; rental NCOA; rental PCOA; catalog request NCOA; catalog request PCOA) to see whether these new address changes prove profitable.
• Test mailing old NCOA addresses to your recent buyers. For some categories like home décor the old addresses prove profitable.
• Don't mail undeliverable addresses (duh), but also don't mail addresses with low mailability scores determined by list hygiene services. Your mail file could have 1.5 percent to 2 percent of addresses with low scores; these low scores are undeliverable.
• Don't mail DMA's pander file, but do mail your own housefile names that show up as DMA pander file hits.
• Check out the suppression file details and set business rules whether to mail deceased names, college ZIP codes, prisons, trailer parks, nursing homes, etc.
• Determine whether you should mail two catalogs to different names if they live at the same address and it's not an apartment building.
• Fill out your carrier routes with more catalogs when you have either eight or nine catalogs already in that carrier route. It's actually free circulation.

Work closely with your merge/purge service bureau to understand your advanced list hygiene. Plan on saving 2 percent to 5 percent each mailing by simply scrubbing out unprofitable names that are identified by list hygiene. The profit impact of cutting out 2 percent to 5 percent of your catalog circulation is a huge boost to your bottom line.