Address Quality Is Critical

By Mark Brousseau

For direct mail marketers, soaring postage costs are putting an even greater emphasis on the quality of mailing address information. That’s according to CDS Global (www.cds-global.com), a leading provider of outsourced services to publishers, retailers, non-profits, financial institutions and other organizations.

USPS statistics state that approximately 8 percent of direct mail is classified as undeliverable due to the inaccuracy of data found in direct mail files, CDS noted. Complicating matters: there are over 41 million individual and family change of address (COA) filings every year – 2 ½ times the number of annual visitors to Walt Disney World’s Magic Kingdom. In addition, 2.3 million businesses file a COA each year. With this in mind, it’s not surprising that mailing lists deteriorate by more than 1 percent per month.

The effects of poor address quality are staggering: Undeliverable as addressed (UAA) mail costs marketers more than $6 billion annually, according to CDS Global. With an eye toward solving this, effective November 23, 2008, all pieces of standard mail will be required to utilize a move update service to ensure that mailing addresses are up-to-date and deliverable. In addition, CDS Global is offering several services to help direct mail marketers ensure the quality of their mailing lists.

How big a challenge is mailing address quality to your organization? Post your comment below.