ow good is your internal database?

By Greg Stine President Polaris, Inc. www.polaris-inc.com

nEPENDING on your business, I'll

Lf wager that 75-95Vo of your business comes from past customers or referrals from your past customers. Do you market to your past customers? You should. They are what keep you in business year after year and they are a source of significant new business as well.

How do you reach them? Through your internal company database, of course. But sadly, one of the most important and often neglected assets of a company or organization is their database of leads, prospects and clients.

A lot of companies make a mess of this critical company asset

The Keys to a Good Database l. Pto, ahead.

Databases are nothing more than lists of data organized so we can manipulate and learn from them. A valuable asset, you should have a plan to protect and maintain your database like a good piece of equipment.

Many problems with databases happen because of the way the database was setup when the comPanY was new. When you set up your database, imagine manipulating not l0 times, but 100 or 1000 times the amount of data you have now. Try to predict what information you will need as your company grows. what kinds of reports you'll want. and the database fields you'll need to sort thal data. You won't accurately predict everything, but if you try, you er than if you don't. will get clos-

2. ri* it now, not later!

There's no time like today to fix and clean up your database. Every day that goes by, you are most likely making any current problems more time consuming to repair. Don't compound the problem by allowing another month or another year to go by without giving it your attention.

3. Control the input.

Once you have clean and accurate data in your database, the best way to protect its integrity is to use the data entry control features of your software. These features force people to correctly and completely fill out their on-screen input forms.

All decent database programs allow you to setup rules for data entry. Date fields must be valid dates; specific fields must have entries in them (no blanks); some fields may be limited to items from a pull-down menu. Don't be afraid to use these tools-if you allow each individual to figure out what to do on their own, five years from now you'll have a mess.

4. Integrate as much as possible. This is often the hardest part of all-while 1007o system integration is rarely achieved, it should still be the goal. Get as many people working together from the same database as is reasonably possible, or at least be sure that the formats are interchangeable.

5. Be strong, don't lose control. Controlling and maintaining a clean, quality database can be very difficult and straight out boring but the results are worth it. When it comes time for that next marketing project and your database no longer holds you back, you'll see the results of all your hard work.

Don't underestimate how difficult it is to set up and maintain a good internal database. I've seen a lot of companies make messes of this critical company asset. So be strong, thoughtful, and diligent. It's well worth it in the long run.

- Mr. Stine is founder, president and director of sales for marketing specialist Polaris Inc. (www.polaris-inc.com), Oakridge, Eugene and Portland, Or.