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Home About Us Contact Us Testimonials Spam-Filter- Proofingİ (SFP) Service Search This Site Search Our Complete Listing of Data Cards Download Our Free Direct Mail Guide Corporate Training Programs | Web Learning Center Building and Managing Your Marketing Database, Cont. Lesson 6: DATABASE LAYOUT AND DATA FORMATTING Below you'll see an example of a professional database layout with suggested field lengths. This layout example comes from Info USA which has two large compiled files -- one for every consumer, and the other for every business in the United States. This is a good example of a layout that works whether you have 30 names, 50,000 names or 10 million names. This example shows field lengths for both business-to-consumer and business-to-business databases in one table. Field lengths for business-to-consumer databases are shown on the left, while field lengths for business-to-business databases are shown on the right. Consumer Field Length Data Field Name Business Field Length 06 Consumer ID number 06 01 Title code 03 Function code 03 Mailstop code 09 Dept., group, etc. 15 Corp. name 30 15 First name 15 01 Middle initial 01 15 Last name 15 30 Primary address 30 16 City 16 02 State 02 09 Zip+4 09 03 Country code 03 04 Carrier route 04 06 Creation date 06 06 Last address change date 06 01 Do not rent 01 01 Do not mail 01 Let's look at a few more examples from Info USA: Business-to-Business Database Layout Field Length Data Field Name 12 Phone 06 SIC Code 06 Franchise Code 01 Ad Size Code 01 Population Code 01 Individual Or Firm 02 Year 04 New Add 14 Last Name 11 First Name 03 Contact Prof Title 01 Contact Title Code 01 Contact Gender 01 Employee Size 01 Sales Volume / Asset Size Code 01 Industry Specific Code 01 HQ / Branch Code 10 Key Code 10 Fax Phone 01 Office Size 06 Production Date 09 Location Number 09 Subsidiary Number 09 Parent Number 06 Primary SIC Business-to-Consumer Database Layout Field Length Data Field Name 01 Gender 12 Delivery Point Bar Code 12 Phone Number 01 Residents Age 04 Year of Birth 02 Month of Birth 01 Income 02 Length of Residence 01 Home Value Code 01 Own/Rent Flag 01 Population Rank 01 House/Apartment 07 Credit Card Type 01 Number of Trade Lines 01 Credit Card Level 01 Land Use Code 06 Date of Last Activity 20 County Name 04 MSA Code 30 MSA Description 10 Key Code 30 Title Address 30 Presort Endorsement Line 01 Marital Status 06 Marriage Date 01 Mortgage Type 06 Mortgage Date 01 Mortgage Loan 01 Finance Type 02 Ethnic Code 01 Loan to Value 01 Expendable Income 01 Networth Rank 01 Presence of Pool 02 Vehicle Group 02 Number of Autos 09 Latitude 09 Longitude 01 Match Level 06 Census Tract 01 Block Group 01 Time Zone Field Length Consumer Demographics Field Length Business Demographics 02 Gender 02 Start date of business 04 Date of birth 01 Employee size 12 Telephone number 01 Sales volume / Asset size code 10 Fax number 01 Professional office size 30 Email 06 SIC code 01 Time zone 01 Industry specific code 02 Household income 01 Business status 01 Marital status 06 Franchise code 02 Number of children 01 Public company 02 Age of children 01 Stock exchange 02 Additional household members 01 Fortune 1000 02 Length of residency 01 Credit rating scores 01 Homeowner / renter 01 Yellow page ad size 01 Dwelling type / size 01 Population code 01 Value of home 01 Headquarter/branch code 05 Occupation 09 Subsidiary number 01 Language preference 09 Locator number 02 Ethnic markets 06 Patent number 02 Education levels 02 Religion 04 Direct response data 04 Household lifestyle interest 04 Household product ownership Coding The Data All of the fields in your database are going to need to be coded so that you can sort on the data. Let's take title code as an example from the layout above. On the business-to-business side, you can see two characters in the field length. At this point you might be thinking, "but how do you write “Vice President of Internal Affairs” in two characters? Well you don’t. Instead, you code the title. You can keep the text title field and use this as your title slug when you write to the individual, but you'll need your corresponding code field in order to segment your file. One of our clients came to us years ago with a file of 60,000 names. This was a business-to-business file. How many titles do you think they came up with? 52,000 and change. And they were all in text fields. How could the computer possibly sort on that data? And of course being able to sort and segment your file by title is critical to the success of your direct marketing campaign because you're going to have different marketing messages and promotion types for different levels and functions. You'll have different titles in business-to-business depending on the industry that you’re in. If you’re in the medical profession, you would have different titles than you would have in the gardening business. If all your products are going into IT companies, then they have a different set of titles. If you’re going into marketing companies, then the titles will also be different as will retail establishments. Here's a good example of title codes: Title Code Title Title Code Title 01 Account Executive 51 Director - Legal Affairs 02 Accountant 52 Director - Manufacturing 03 Administration 53 Director - Marketing 04 Auditor 54 Director - Personnel 05 Cashier 55 Director - Plant 06 Engineer 56 Director - Public Relations 07 Loan Officer 57 Director - Purchasing 08 Publisher 58 Director - R&D 09 Miscellaneous 59 Director - Sales 10 Board of directors - Chairman 60 Director - Traffic 11 Board of directors - Member 70 Manager - Accounting 12 Chairman 71 Manager - Administration 20 Chief Advertising Officer (CAO) 72 Manager - Advertising 21 Chief Executive Officer (CEO) 73 Manager - Branch 22 Chief Financial Officer (CFO) 74 Manager - Corp. Com. 23 Chief Operating Officer (COO) 75 Manager - Data Proc. 24 Executive Vice President 76 Manager - Gen. Counsel 25 President 77 Manager - HR 26 Owner 78 Manager - Info. Systems 27 Partner 79 Manager - International 30 Vice President 80 Manager - Investor Services 31 Vice President - Senior 81 Manager - Legal Affairs 32 Vice President - Junior 82 Manager - Manufacturing 33 Division - President 83 Manager - Marketing 34 Division - Manager 84 Manager - Personnel 35 Corporate Secretary 85 Manager - Plant 36 Secretary 86 Manager - Public Relations 37 Treasurer 87 Manager - Purchasing 38 Trust Officer 88 Manager - R&D 39 Controller 89 Manager - Sales 40 Director - Accounting 90 Manager - Traffic 41 Director - Administration 42 Director - Advertising 43 Director - Branch 44 Director - Corp. Com. 45 Director - Data Processing 46 Director - General Counsel 47 Director - Human Resources 48 Director - Information Systems 49 Director - International 50 Director - investor Services Of course you'll have to set up the coding system which might seem like a lot of work up front. But the work will definitely pay off over time. And without it, your file will basically be useless. Plus, if you ever decide to rent your house file, you'll need the codes. Business-to-business mailers always want to target their offers by title/function. Building and Managing Your Marketing Database Introduction Planning Your Database Database Applications What Data Should You Collect and Track? Tracking Transactions Promotional Source Codes Database Layout and Data Formatting Case Study: US Media Company Back Next

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