What Is Address Data Quality, And Why Is It Crucial For Your Business?
Would you agree with us if we said that darts and address data quality are very similar? Before you jump up and say no, let us make our case. You win at darts when you land the most throws at the centre of the dart board. In other words, the more centre shots you can land, the more your chances of winning.
Maintaining address data quality is not so different from this. The more accurate address data you have, the more your chances of running marketing and business operations for your company. Here, we explain the role of address data for your business organisation and how you can streamline your marketing and communication efforts.
What Is Address Data Quality?
As the name suggests, address data quality indicates the quality of postal mail addresses. A postal address must exhibit three qualities or conditions to ensure total address quality.
- The address has to be complete
- The address has to be correct
- The address has to be current
When Is An Address Complete?
You can say that an address is complete when it contains all the address elements to deliver mail accurately to that address. In other words, you need every detail from the street numbers to the complete postcode to ensure address data quality for your postal addresses.
When Is An Address Correct?
Sometimes an address can look legit and still be a fake one. These addresses are like knock-off G-shocks you can get for super low prices. They both look and feel the same until you try to use them. Hence, the address data quality check ensures you don’t get a knock-off or fake address.
Creating a fake address is easy. Some may do it intentionally, and sometimes it’s just an honest mistake. The only way to determine the correctness of and ensure address quality is to validate it using a reliable address database. In the UK, the Royal Mail maintains this address database.
When Is An Address Current?
Sometimes, the address could be legit and complete, yet the mail is undeliverable. In such cases, the reason for poor address data quality is that the address is not current. In other words, the addressee no longer lives at the address.
Perhaps the customer moved to a different address without informing the postal service provider. Or maybe the customer temporarily moved for renovation. It is not current if the addressee can’t receive the mail at the given address. Hence, it lacks the address quality for accurate mail delivery.
Why Does Address Data Quality Matter For Your Business?
Unlike what you might think, the address data quality can significantly impact business organisations and their operations. Most businesses remain in the dark about the impact of low-quality addresses until a detailed analysis reveals the problem.
Below we will discuss some problems that business organisations could face by ignoring the quality of address data. So, if any of the following sounds a little familiar, it might be because of your low address data quality.
Compromised Or Low Productivity
25% to 30% of data becomes inaccurate every year, and it can hurt companies’ sales and marketing efforts. Business organisations spend significant money on getting rid of erroneous data. But when it comes to the address data quality, most businesses tend to slack off.
However, you can no longer afford to ignore address quality anymore. Direct mail marketing and other location-based marketing efforts are once again becoming relevant. Hence, having accurate address data is a non-negotiable now. Furthermore, mailing address data is vital in multi and omnichannel campaigns.
Effects On Reputation And Data Security
Imagine sending an important document to your customers via mail, like an invoice or a collection letter. If you do not maintain address data quality, you may send these crucial documents to the wrong address. The customer may miss payments because of fault at your end and may even have to pay a fine for delayed payments.
It would be even worse for eCommerce companies because who would buy from a website that consistently makes misdeliveries? As you can see, low postal address data quality can affect your brand’s reputation and not in a good way. And on top of all this, there are also data security problems.
For instance, a healthcare organisation sending the medical reports of a patient to the wrong address can compromise sensitive information. Businesses in every industry vertical can ruin their reputation and compromise data security if their address quality is not up to the mark.
Thankfully, there is a simple solution to this problem. You can use an advanced address verification solution like PostGrid to verify your addresses against Royal Mail’s official address database. PostGrid’s software solution ensures address data quality for your business.
Limited Scope For Automation
The only way business organisations depend heavily on automation for meeting their customer’s needs. It has come to the point that organisations that do not use automation are slowly becoming obsolete. If you don’t address quality to the required standards, it can affect your ability to automate your business operations.
For instance, take the case of sending invoices (or other essential documents) to the customer. You can ensure the accurate delivery of your invoices and other crucial documents if you address data quality and use automation. Moreover, you can use PostGrid’s address verification and direct mail automation tool to get an optimised mailing system.
That’s not all. PostGrid’s print and mail API can integrate with your CRM to personalise your mailers. And we are not just talking about invoices. You can send everything from postcards, brochures, business letters and much more. On the other hand, PostGrid’s address verification API ensures the address quality in your CRM database.
Negative Impact On Customer Experience
The average consumer expects quick and responsive interactions from your business organization. Even a slight interruption to the buying journey can discourage the customer. Not having a solution like PostGrid for maintaining address data quality would also mean that you can’t access advanced features like Address Autocomplete.
PostGrid’s Address Autocomplete is a feature that enhances the customer experience. It uses the information the customer types in and the server location to suggest verified addresses. Besides ensuring address quality, PostGrid provides a convenient customer experience.
Typing in the long address to make a purchase or verify payments is often reason enough for the customer to abandon their cart. Hence, PostGrid ensures there is no negative impact on customer experience while keeping a close eye on the address quality of your customer database.
Financial Losses
The negative impact of poor address data quality extends beyond operational roadblocks or customer experience. It can also hurt your business’s financial performance. Of course, this should be no surprise because insufficient data anywhere eventually leads to financial losses.
You must repeat the process whenever a mail or package is undeliverable to the correct address. The postage and other expenses of the undeliverable mail alone can cause significant losses. Then there is the additional cost of sending the mail all over again. And all because you couldn’t maintain address quality for your business organisation.
But, if you thought that’s all the financial loss that poor address data quality can cause, you are wrong. There is more. Address inaccuracies can lead to operational problems, which would require an inspection, which means more expenses for your organisation. Then there is the cost of fixing your records, which can add up over time.
Considering all this, wouldn’t it be easier to invest in an advanced address verification tool like PostGrid? Think about all the money you could save by ensuring address data quality for your business. Furthermore, you can optimise your direct mail operations using PostGrid’s automated solution and eliminate manual errors.
How To Ensure Address Data Quality For Your Business?
The only way to ensure address data quality for your business is to verify the address database against a reliable address database. And there is no address database more extensive or authoritative about UK addresses as Royal Mail. Hence, it would be best to opt for a verified address verification system like PostGrid that can use the Royal Mail address database.
PostGrid is not just a tool to verify your address database and ensure address quality for your organisation. It offers several additional features and capabilities to enhance your business operations. Some of the noticeable attributes you can access through PostGrid are listed below.
Bulk Address Verification Via CSV File
With an advanced tool like PostGrid, ensuring the address quality of your database is significantly easier. You can download the CSV file of all your customers and verify them with a button.
Address Parsing And Standardisation
PostGrid does not just verify the addresses you feed it. Our advanced address verification software splits the address into small parts. It standardises them as per the guidelines of the Royal Mail. Hence, PostGrid makes mail processing fast and ensures zero delays in the process. In other words, PostGrid significantly improves the address quality and verifies it.
Address Autocomplete
PostGrid’s address verification software comes with an autocomplete feature that can automatically fill addresses on your website and landing pages. PostGrid accesses Royal Mail’s address database and detects the server location to suggest the most relevant address to the user. Hence, PostGrid not only ensures address data quality but also enhances customer experience.
Apart from ensuring address data quality for your business, PostGrid also provides you with additional features such as:
- Fully documented API library
- Test and live environments
- Geocoding
- Advanced analytics
- County data
- Census data
Ready to Get Started?
Start transforming and automating your offline communications with PostGrid
The post Address Data Quality appeared first on PostGrid UK.
Via https://www.postgrid.co.uk/address-data-quality/
source https://postgridunitedkingdom.weebly.com/blog/address-data-quality
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