Data Quality Do’s and Don’ts – Part 1: Degrading Data Quality

In today’s highly mobile market, up to 30% of a firm’s CRM contact data quality can degrade each year. People get hired, fired, promoted and change jobs; they move and change addresses; they get married and divorced; some retire and a few die. Adding to the problem is “garbage” aka typos, misspellings, transposed numbers and personal contacts. All of this potential for bad data means that if you don’t pay attention to data quality, your end users will begin to distrust the data and, by association, the CRM system. It’s also important to appreciate that your CRM data represents a very important asset – relationships, and relationships represent revenue.

Prioritize Data Quality & Maintenance

To encourage ongoing system adoption and utilization, the quality of data and its maintenance have to be top priorities. Good data quality requires continuous, pervasive effort. Resources have to be dedicated – including time, money and people. Processes and procedures need to be put in place to maintain consistent quality. Most importantly, training and communication are essential to ensure that end users don’t create unnecessary duplicates or introduce more bad data into the system.

There are several areas to focus on to ensure ongoing data quality success. Stay tuned for Part 2 to learn more…