Data Cleaning Eliminates Corrupt Data
So Your Database Works For Your

Corrupt data within databases is always a serious issue for your business. Increasing use of data collection for contact lists used in a wide variety of media, including paper mailings and electronic mail (email) expand the severity of any database problems. The sheer quantity of data can place a great burden on quality issues. Bad (corrupt) data can cause severe problems for your business and requires prompt attention to prevent costly waste and undo expenses related to database management and implementaton.

Data cleaning is a process that makes sure your data is consistently accurate plus properly formatted. The process of data cleaning, also known as data scrubbing, prepares data so it will work for your business.

Approximately 35% of all bulk mail mailed annually goes into the US Postal Service garbage dumpsters annually due to erroneaous addresses. Make certain your next mailing campaign does not get ruined by bad data.

At Northwest Database Services we provide several data cleaning services including total reconstruction and merge and purge, as well as ACS, PAVE, and USPS CASS certified code procedures.

You can find out much more about data cleaning on the Data Scrubbing and Data Cleaning page.

Your data should be in a standard industry mailing list database file format so your personnel or database contractors, like Northwest Database Services can work with your existing data quickly and easily. Standard formatting expedites the the data cleaning process.

Data cleaning is very much a necessity for your business; We use the following list of foramts to make your data cleaning project go smoothly. Common database formats include, but are not limited to: Microsoft Access DB, dBase III, and FoxPro. Microsoft Excel or fixed and delimited ASCII files are typically used only for data exchange purposes, however, they are not considered standard database formats.

Getting Correct Data Alignment

Data alignment locates misplaced data, that is erroneously placed one data field, and relocates to the correct field. Following this process, all address data is now in appropriate address fields, while contact names are placed in their proper fields, etc. Although your label printing may appear correct, the sorting, querying, coding, along with your reporting will be incorrect when your data is not properly located within your databse file.

Standardizing Your Data

Following the data alignment procedure, we standardize how it will be stored to your database file using data industry standards or to your particular business rules. Note: standardized data results in much faster data cleaning projects as well.

Contact us for more Data Cleaning Information or call 360-841-8168.

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