DATABASES

Business Computing Tips
By Karen Fainges

Keeping lists of your customers, orders, sales and a myriad of other things
are well worth while, but they can be a lot of work to set up and keep up to
date. Why bother?

Well, being able to e-mail, fax or post to all your prospects at the touch
of a button is one of the best reasons. Most programs now have mail merge.
This lets you print names and addresses or send electronic letters
automatically to everyone in your database. They can even sort the addresses
first so you only send messages to those in 4066 or with Company names
staring with G. This means you can target your letters to clients that will
get the most benefit from your message. This is a huge saving in time and
money. It will also keep your customers a lot happier than if you send
details of a local sale to your international clients.

The main thing is to keep your database current. Once every six months, use
the white pages or something similar to go through your list and delete
anyone that has moved. This job is made a lot easier if all your
correspondence has some sort of change of address form on it. A Reply Paid
address or postage paid envelope will make it easier for your clients to
actually send it all back to you.

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Please feel free to pass this newsletter on to your friends, just keep my
name on it.
Karen Fainges holds a Bachelor of Business, and a Grad. Dip. of Vocational
and Educational Training. A tutor for all ages, she specialises in helping
people get started on the long road to technology. "It has to be practical,
it has to be cheap, and it has to work."
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