There’s nothing worse than preparing to run a batch of letters, emails, labels or a filter and realizing the data just isn’t ‘good’ or ‘clean’ enough to get a good list. Well here’s 5 Cool Ideas for maintaining good GoldMine data.
• Use the “Required Data Entry†checkbox under a field’s security properties to force users to enter data in a field like contact, address, city, state, zip, or contact type.
• Use the Lookup.ini to auto-populate the Dear field, which is used to denote what should go after the word ‘Dear’ in a letter, with the contact’s first name.
• Standardize your lookup entries for fields like contact type and use the field’s lookup Setup to force valid input, i.e. to pick for something on the list.
• Use a program like AccuMail Gold® or GoldPlus to scan your database to correct bad addresses. (Interested, ask me for more information)
• Develop a set of data standards for users. These should spell out which fields should be filled in as well as formatting, e.g. “IBM†or “GM†rather than “I.B.M.†or “General Motorsâ€.