• by editor , David Baker , November 7, 2005

These e-mail addresses are wrong: Dogman@hotmial.com. asdf@asdf.com. Do you see the mistakes? With more users entering incorrect e-mail addresses, we have to work harder to clean up our databases. I recently had an interesting conversation with industry veterans Bill Kaplan, CEO and co-founder of FreshAddress, Inc., and Matt Blumberg, Chairman and CEO of Return Path, Inc., about changes in our industry. Specifically, we tried to get to the bottom of what is shifting in our approaches to different e-mail database hygiene services like E-mail Append, E-mail Change of Address (ECOA) and Validation Services.

What follows is an excerpt from our discussion. And I think you'll find the insight from these two industry veterans informative.

E-mail Insider: What is the typical match rate and return on an E-mail Append project--and why is matching important today?

Bill Kaplan: On a first pass, we're seeing 15 to 20 percent match rates for a Household Match and 10 to 15 percent rates for an Individual Match. The Household Match makes sense for companies that want to connect with someone in a household with whom they have a previous relationship. Individual Matches make sense for financial institutions and other companies where privacy is of the utmost importance. Over the course of our first year of business, we are able to double the above-mentioned rates.

Matt Blumberg: We typically see first-pass match rates in the 10 percent range when we match an e-mail address to a postal address, with higher match rates if multiple third-party databases are tapped over the course of a year. Clients should make sure they are really getting what they pay for with E-mail Append. For example, deliverability is one of the biggest issues; make sure you don't pay for a single address that hasn't been successfully mailed (with some kind of third-party verification of deliverability) within the last week.

EI: How often should someone append a customer database?

Kaplan: We work with our clients to ensure they are optimizing their multi-channel efforts. Research has shown that multi-channel buyers are worth significantly more than single-channel customers, so the sooner you can communicate with your customers or donors on multiple levels, the better.

Blumberg: Reviewing efforts on a quarterly basis is traditional with most of our clients. The frequency of E-mail Append isn't nearly as important as the process for getting it done. We recommend extreme caution to clients who use E-mail Append as a primary means of building their online customer file. These days, it's too easy to run afoul of good privacy and permission practices--or worse, upset customers and lead them to complain about you to their ISP.

EI: When does it make sense to do an E-mail Change of Address, and what should we expect when we do it?

Kaplan: With the annual e-mail address attrition rates and dormancy rates nearing 50 percent, companies and organizations need to stay on top of ECOA in order to remain competitive. We typically match seven to 12 percent on our first pass and are able to double these results over the course of our first year.

Blumberg: The biggest thing that clients need to be aware of with ECOA is that they will get what they pay for. Many unscrupulous vendors market E-mail Append under the guise of ECOA - but the two services are completely different. A true ECOA service collects the old and new e-mail addresses directly from the consumer, along with explicit permission to use that information to update the user's online subscriptions.

If you'd like to read the entire abstract of this discussion, please e-mail me your request (dbaker@agency.com) with "Database Hygiene" in the subject line.