Database marketer Experian rolled out its online data cleansing service to the Irish and Italian markets to enable more targeted direct marketing campaigns.
The launch of Experian Intact in Ireland and Italy at www.experianintact.ie and www.experianintact.it is meant to help U.S. and international companies in those markets clean and improve the quality of their data.
Experian Intact is already available in Britain, France, Spain and the Netherlands. These markets, and Ireland and Italy, are adept at online and offline DM in various degrees.
“In terms of the food chain of development, Ireland is maturing quickly, but it's like Canada next to the U.S. — many British companies operate in Ireland,” said David Coupe, managing director of Experian Marketing Services International, Nottingham, Britain. “Italy is probably the next wave, although Holland's quite mature and Spain's maturing quickly.”
Companies submitting data to the Irish and Italian Experian Intact sites receive a free audit identifying the extent of their data's inaccuracy. The audit's findings will help the users clean, suppress and improve their data.
“The audit will tell you how many records fit into various categories, and then the user can select which services he wishes to take [for a fee],” Coupe said.
Experian Intact in Italy offers address validation, de-duplication, telephone verification and data enhancement. The Irish service also includes the national addressing standard service. Experian Intact is claimed as Europe's most widely used online data cleansing service, cleaning an estimated 600 million records in the past year.
Coupe said the benefits of just-in-time data cleansing are many. Poor data quality can hurt a company's finances, ability to meet regulatory standards and brand reputation.
“Clearly, there's not a point in contacting people who are either dead, moved or simply don't wish to receive it, and they are the benefits we seek to bring with this service,” Coupe said.
Mickey Alam Khan covers Internet marketing campaigns and e-commerce, agency news as well as circulation for DM News and DMNews.com. To keep up with the latest developments in these areas, subscribe to our daily and weekly e-mail newsletters by visiting www.dmnews.com/newsletters
