Melissa Data, a provider of data quality, NCOALink and data enrichment solutions, is partnering with UAA Clearinghouse to help marketers identify and suppress undeliverable names and addresses in their mailing lists.
Addressing the needs of direct mailers who face increasing postage and production costs while trying to weather the continuing economic downturn, through this partnership, Melissa Data will provide its customers with immediate savings by identifying and removing undeliverable addresses that cannot be identified using traditional address hygiene processes like USPS NCOALink Move Update service. "It provides an extra service that mailers can take advantage of, after they have done what the USPS requires as far as Move Updating their mailing list before a mailing to receive postal discounts," Greg Brown, director of marketing at Melissa Data, tells 5 Minute Briefing.
The USPS currently collects formal change of address (COA) requests and distributes the latest 48 months of these records to its non-exclusive licenses for NCOALink Move Updating processing, which is required to qualify mailings for First-Class and Standard Mail discounts. However, more than 40% of people that move do not file a COA with the USPS. UAA Clearinghouse works with various magazine publishers, telecommunications and financial services providers, and private mail box providers to gather consumer-reported change-of-address notices and collect ACS (address change service) intelligence on 350-million mailings per month covering 75 million households. If a match is returned, the mailer will receive notice that the address or name is undeliverable and the reason why, including death, divorce, for example.
After Melissa Data customers utilize NCOALink processing to update their mailing list and qualify for postage discounts, they can then run the list against UAA Clearinghouse's data to suppress the undeliverable marketing mail names and addresses not caught by NCOALink. Customers only pay for the records that have been updated or flagged, thereby avoiding the cost of postage and production that would otherwise be wasted on undeliverable mail pieces.
Aside from the business advantages provided by the eliminating UAA mail, there is also an environmental impact, notes Brown. "As people look to not only market smarter but be environmentally sensitive, these are easy things that actually provide ROI while helping eliminate a lot of waste." To learn more about Melissa Data's new UAA Processing services, go here.