All posts by Ashly.Arndt@experian.com

Knowing what kind of address you’re mailing to can be important and often will influence the amount you pay for postage and shipping. Shipping to residential addresses, for example, tends to be more expensive than shipping to commercial ones. There are residential and commercial addresses, mixed addresses, as well as post office boxes. Post office boxes (P.O. Box) are traditionally used by individuals to receive mail in areas where mail may not be delivered directly to their homes. People also use P.O. boxes for security, privacy, the need for quicker delivery, and to maintain a permanent mailing address.  What is a P.O box address? A P.O. box address typically will have "P.O. Box ###" as the full address line, after the street address, or in the second address field. Sometimes it may appear without the letters, like "#324" or shortened to "POB 373". Shipping to P.O Boxes: what you need to know Sometimes merchants or e-commerce vendors will not ship to P.O boxes. If you use a courier service, like UPS or FedEx, these companies don't guarantee shipments to P.O. boxes the same way they will with standard mail to a home or business address. If you promise customers that their shipments will arrive within certain time frames, P.O. boxes can cause problems for your service guarantees. Also, if you need to know where your customers actually live, these addresses will get in your way. How to determine if an address is a P.O Box The easiest way to identify whether an address is a P.O. box is to use address verification software. Our address verification services provide indicators that identify P.O. box addresses during validation, giving you the information you need to choose the appropriate shipping method and keep your operations running efficiently. Address verification can also identify Commercial Mail Receiving Agency (CMRA) addresses—private mailbox services offered by companies such as UPS and FedEx. These addresses may resemble standard street addresses but function differently than residential or commercial locations. Knowing whether you're shipping to a P.O. box or a CMRA helps you make more informed fulfillment decisions. Improve delivery accuracy with address verification Understanding your address data helps reduce shipping costs, minimize returned packages, and improve the customer experience by increasing delivery accuracy. With Experian's address verification services and free address lookup tools, you can quickly identify P.O. boxes, CMRAs, and other address characteristics before they create operational challenges. Learn how Experian's address verification solutions can help you validate addresses, reduce delivery issues, and improve operational efficiency.

As a marketing or data professional, you may be familiar with the term “data profiling”. It is the process of examining a dataset to glean information about its contents. This can include statistics about the distribution of values, patterns within the data, unusual values or outliers, and in-depth analysis of its accuracy, or quality. Data profiling can be used to get a better understanding of your data, identify potential issues, and make sure that your data is clean and ready for analysis, or use. In this article, we’ll take a closer look at data profiling and examine some of the common use cases where it is most useful. Why profile your data? Before we explore some of the common use cases for data profiling, we’re going to look at the reasons why it can be so beneficial: Understand your data assets – it is extremely common for large and complex organizations to not fully understand their data landscape. Multiple territories and varying legacy systems that store data lead to data living in silos with varying levels of quality. A data quality report card helps you understand what data your organization holds and how it could be handled going forward. Boost accuracy and quality – by the very nature of the processes you undertake when profiling your data, you will spot inaccuracies and inconsistencies very quickly. Putting plans in place to fix these errors and long-term plans to prevent the same issue in the future will help you protect the value of your data assets. Improve decision-making – in the same way that data profiling can help you spot data inaccuracies, it can also ensure that your core data assets provide more reliable results when used for forecasting or planning. The old saying of “rubbish in / rubbish out” still holds very true and you want to give your organization the best chance to make the right decisions the first time round. Common use cases for data profiling Below, we discuss some of the use cases where data profiling offers the most value: Data governance is the key to sustainably unlocking the full value of the data you own – so that it can underpin your data strategy, not just today, but on a long-term basis. Customer segmentation is an excellent use case for data profiling and something that every organization should undertake. By segmenting your customer data effectively and building a single customer view you unlock a wealth of insights, such as, who is most likely to purchase your products, where you should put physical store locations, and what marketing channels will be most effective to grow your sales. Data migration is a complicated and time-consuming process, but one that is essential for large organizations to be proficient at. A common mistake is for organizations to rush the investigatory phase of their migration, shifting to data movement before a true understanding of the data is present. Data profiling is a crucial stepping stone in the migration process so that you know with supreme clarity what data you have, what will be moving, and where to. Talk to Experian about profiling your data Experian has a range of tools and services to help you profile your data. Our intelligent, self-service data quality and enrichment platform,  Aperture Data Studio, can provide you with all the tools you need to understand and utilize your data assets. Get in touch today:

In today’s digital-forward society, you can’t avoid the growing importance of data—especially in the realm of business. Regardless of an organization’s size, industry, or business model, you can’t plan for optimal growth and success without also discussing data. A mature approach to data can help businesses build greater trust in their information, make more informed decisions, and use data more effectively across the organization. But what exactly does it mean to achieve data maturity, and how can you determine whether your business needs to optimize its approach to data? Below, we’ll delve into what data maturity truly entails while helping you discover where your business lands on this scale. What is data maturity? In the business world, data refers to any information an organization collects surrounding its customers, workers, marketing plans, and organization at large. But if data is the information collected and processed, what exactly is data maturity? Put simply, data maturity refers to the extent to which your business can collect valuable data, derive meaning from it, and leverage this information in the decision-making process. Your business’s data maturity is determined by how your organization’s data is: Processed Analyzed Utilized It’s important to note that the quantity of data does not directly correlate to the maturity of the data in question. The goal is to strive for quality data collection that helps an organization successfully make the best marketing and operational decisions possible. At Experian, we track three key components that make up data maturity: Strategy: We look at the processes behind data management, from implementing data quality control measures to sharing insights with a wider range of roles. People and skills: We take note of data ownership, considering whether there is a chief data officer in place and who manages insights across the business. We believe that data skills are becoming increasingly important, whether an organization has a data literacy program or is hiring for data skills. Technology: We look at an organization’s tech stack, data quality management functionality, and how user-friendly the software is. Depending on the organization’s data skill level and resources, technology can make or break the data experience. The three elements live across the four levels of data maturity, which we discuss in the next section. The 4 levels of data maturity—how data mature is your business? Below, we’ll delve into the four stages we use to assess data maturity that can serve as a benchmark for how your business is performing from a data quality standpoint. 1. Under-developed If you’ve never really put much thought into your business’s data and find that data at large has never been a topic of discussion in your organization, you’re likely to find yourself starting from square one. At the base level, organizations that lack an understanding of data quality and its implications fall into an under-developed category. If you notice your organization confronting data quality issues, manually fixing data problems as they arise, and having an inconsistent understanding of data across the business, you may fall into this category. For organizations at the under-developed stage, establishing a more intentional approach to data management can create a stronger foundation for future progress. Identifying existing data quality challenges, defining ownership, and introducing consistent processes can help your organization begin moving toward greater data maturity. Reaching out to a data management expert can also be a helpful place to start. 2. Reactive Maybe your organization has started to think about data and its importance within your business, but it hasn’t laid the foundation for the proper metrics or processes necessary to utilize this information in a meaningful way just yet. As the name indicates, a “reactive” business reacts to data when issues arise and need to be fixed. However, discussions surrounding data aren’t evenly spread throughout the business. While tackling data quality issues in silos is a start, it’s crucial to expand the data experience throughout your organization. This means that if only certain departments have the tools and knowledge necessary to leverage data insights, it’s important to expand data access and training to those outside of traditional IT roles, too. 3. Proactive Moving along the data maturity scale, businesses are likely to achieve a proactive state once they’ve established clear data quality success metrics that help them make better use of their data across the board. Within this level, there’s a more universal knowledge of data across the organization, which helps team members use data in meaningful ways when performing their daily tasks. There’s also an increased emphasis on data discovery, which places the organization a tier above “reactive” businesses that focus more heavily on root cause analysis. If you think your business identifies with a proactive level, you may still confront issues surrounding data trustworthiness and optimal data governance. Investing in a trusted data management program could be the next step in your journey toward higher data maturity. 4. Optimized At the highest level, businesses with the greatest data maturity have established an advanced data extraction and interpretation strategy to reap more business value from their data. An organization in this category has successfully: Established advanced data quality measuresCreated confidence in the quality of its dataInvested in the right data professionals to oversee company-wide data assetsIncorporated data quality monitoring into everyday operations While it may seem like achieving a high level of data maturity is the endpoint, it’s important to note that data management is an ongoing process. Businesses at an optimized level can still benefit from improving their data management programs over time to reduce costs and automate more of their daily processes. If you’re still not sure where your organization lands on the data maturity scale, we’ve put together a free assessment that can help you get a better idea of where you stand so that you can begin taking the steps necessary to strengthen your approach to data. My business isn't as data-mature as I thought: What now? Regardless of where your business lands on the data maturity scale, your business could still benefit from enhancing your data’s trustworthiness and developing new data quality strategies as time progresses. Data isn’t stagnant, so your data strategy shouldn’t be, either. In the modern world of business, data has become a competitive asset, and what you do with the information you collect matters. At Experian, data is top of mind for every decision we make. When you reach out to a team member, one of our data quality experts can connect you with the resources you need to kickstart your data maturity journey. Unlock the importance of data in your business Building greater data maturity can help your organization get more value from its data and create a stronger foundation for informed decision-making. Data quality and governance should remain important considerations for your business—regardless of your organization’s industry, size, or overarching goals. As you plan for the future, evaluating your current data management practices can help uncover opportunities to strengthen how data is managed, trusted, and used across the organization. Explore how strengthening data quality and data management can help your organization advance its data maturity journey and make data a more valuable part of future business planning. Fill out the form to connect with an expert:

Address verification is the process of determining whether an address is accurate and properly formatted while it also gives valuable data about the address. This process saves time and money by offering accurate data using information from the USPS and international carriers, including whether each address is categorized as a business or residential address. Businesses that utilize address verification tools are able to provide information directly to their customers with confidence, avoiding extra fees and returned mail. Address verification and the important data related to it allows businesses to make more informed and cost-effective decisions throughout their mailing campaigns. Altogether, address verification is a key tool in effectively reaching customers and having an accurate picture regarding shipping expenses, and businesses should know how to use address verification to their advantage. What is the difference between business addresses and residential addresses? When it comes to shipping, business addresses and residential addresses are viewed differently by mail carriers. Businesses should be aware of these differences before planning a mailing campaign or delivering to customers. The costs of shipping can vary based on the type of address to which you’re sending. In fact, private shippers may charge an address correction fee if an address has been wrongly identified as a residence or business. From the perspective of a mail carrier, business addresses are more convenient to deliver to as they are usually located closer together in dense commercial areas. This allows carriers to deliver more packages in a shorter amount of time. Alternatively, residential addresses are typically more spread out, using more time and taking carriers away from their high-density delivery route, which usually raises shipping costs. As a result of the differences in mailing between the two types of addresses, it is crucial that businesses have accurate data in their system. This data allows them to understand where each mailing is being sent in order to avoid unwanted fees and make sure that each one reaches its target. How different carriers classify residential addresses All mail carriers categorize addresses as either residential or business addresses. However, the criteria used to define a residential address can differ depending on which mail carrier you use. This means that although an address may be considered residential by the USPS, it may not be considered residential by a private mail carrier. The USPS designates each address as either residential or business based on the purpose of the address. Regardless of the location of the address, the USPS focuses on whether or not the address itself is home to a business or a residence. When mailing through the USPS, shipping costs are the same regardless of which address type you are shipping to. On the other hand, private carriers rely on city zoning for designating addresses. This means that for private carriers, the actual purpose of the address is unimportant. If a business is located in a zone that is used primarily for residential purposes, then the business will be categorized by the carrier as having a residential address. Because private carriers charge higher fees for residential addresses, in these instances, businesses may need to anticipate paying a higher cost for commercial shipping in these zones. What is a Residential Delivery Indicator (RDI)? Residential Delivery Indicator (RDI) identifies whether an address is categorized as residential or commercial. RDI is a data type sourced and shared by the USPS. The USPS makes this data available to address verification tools for the sake of rate shopping and analysis. What is Record Type? Record Type is another descriptor provided by the USPS to give more information about an address. USPS uses Record Type to specify an address type further, providing information about the type of residence or business by using more specific categories. Record Type Includes the following values: “F” = Firm or business“G” = General delivery“H” = High-rise“P” = PO Box“R” = Rural route or highway contract route“S” = Street Using the RDI and Record Type codes help you understand what kind of address you are sending to, and this can sometimes help you save on costs for shipping and mailing, while also giving you a sense of the mix of addresses where your business delivers its goods. Experian’s address verification tools give your business access to both RDI and Record Type in each dataset so that you can have a complete picture of the addresses you are sending to. Benefits of identifying a business address vs. a residential address Maintaining a database that accurately identifies residential and business addresses is a crucial part of any mailing strategy. By having access to accurate and up-to-date data, your business can boost its performance in the following ways: Have a more informed mailing strategy Information obtained from the address verification process, like RDI and Record Type, allows your business to gain more insight about customer locations, delivery tracking and more efficient shipping routes. An optimized shipping route will shorten delivery time, reduce shipping costs and create more satisfied customers. An informed and effective mailing strategy helps your business stay connected with customers and ultimately increases sales. Reduce return mail Using address verification tools gives your business confidence that your mail will be delivered the first time. Returned mail translates to lost time, materials and money. Managing return mail also takes more energy for employees who need to correct and sort it. A database complete with accurate and valid addresses will help you make sure that you have the correct address and that you pay the correct shipping costs for the type of address you are sending to, preventing return mail and protecting your investment. Increase your marketing impact When you are confident that your materials will reach their intended target, you can be assured your message will be received. Businesses that verify addresses will see a higher return on investment for marketing materials as they know which clients they are reaching and are less likely to receive returned mail or pay for address correction fees. Sending the right message the first time allows your marketing to reach clients without losing money on avoidable fees or errors. How to use address verification to verify a business address Experian’s address verification tools allow you and your business to verify each address so that you know where your packages and other mailings are going. With accurate data, your business is able to avoid address correction fees, reduce returned mail and properly connect with customers. Our address verification solutions help you improve customer experience, reduce costs, and boost business performance. Fill out the form to learn more: