The Power of Contact Management
Many people who have a home-based business don’t realize what an incredible tool they already have at their fingertips, a tool which when utilized to its full potential can increase sales and client contact measurably and immediately.
If you keep your contacts in a Rolodex file, 
an address book, or a file folder on miscellaneous scraps of paper, than you are probably not getting the most you can from those contacts. Even if you have a casually-entered contact database on your computer, you could be losing out on sales or leads. In order to keep the energy and excitement building with clients, regular contact is key.
If you do not have your contact names in an electronic database, entered properly, there is no way to do a targeted postcard mailing or emailing. Please don’t underestimate the power of a targeted blast---it is NOT the same as junk mail, or “spam” (unsolicited email)--- anyone who has signed a mailing list, or given you their card with his or her email address has given you permission to contact them. 
Many of my clients have successfully utilized a postcard mailing to remind their contacts of an upcoming event or sale, which ends up being a visual cue they can hang on their fridge. You can easily print four postcards per sheet on cardstock, cutting down on cost. Photo courtesy of Evan Elliott
Email is also an excellent and cost-effective way to reach many people over a wide geographic area in a short space of time. With email, there is little or no cost involved (once the names are entered), plus the client has the option of printing the information, forwarding it to others, or disregarding it without wasting paper.
Let me explain (in a very simplified form) how a database works, so you can see the importance of entering the information consistently.
A contact database (such as MS Outlook, Palm Desktop, ACT, Goldmine etc) is comprised of what is called fields, each field representing a discrete piece of the information about the person or business you are tracking, such as First Name, Last Name, Street, Birthday, Area Code, Zip Code, whether they are a friend, family member, business associate, any preferences they may have with regard to your product or services… virtually any information that you can think of that you might want to call up at some future time.
When these fields are entered consistently, the power and the beauty of the database can express itself through the SORT and FIND functions. Try doing THAT with your paper Rolodex!
As I mentioned earlier, there are many good contact management programs on the market, or you can hire a professional developer to create a custom database to suit your needs, but regardless of what you use, here are some important things to remember:
Ø Always be consistent in the way you enter the information, i.e., always capitalize the first letter, but keep the rest in lower case, always use Y for yes, always enter phone numbers in the same format, such as xxx-xxx-xxxx, enter dates the same way each time, etc.
Ø Use one field for each discrete piece of information. If you put the entire phone number with the area code all in one field, it will later be difficult to sort by area code. If you put both the first and last name in the same field, it will be impossible to sort by last name.
Ø Most important, use one database for all your clients, even if you have more than one aspect of your business. Use categories to make a separate interest field to distinguish them.
Nowadays, with the increased popularity of portable contact management devices, it becomes critical to remain consistent in the way that you enter information into your databases. When it comes time to transfer your information from one device to the other, you must have conformity of fields, or the process will be a nightmare, and may not work at all.
Personally, I love the flexibility and ease of use of Outlook (not to be confused with Outlook Express). I use it as my email program, to hold my contacts, as a task list, and more! I honestly can't imagine my life as productive as it is without Outlook, and yet I know I barely scrape the surface in what it can do for me. For that, 
I turn to the unparalleled expertise of Paul Wagner, the Software Magician. He offers a great newsletter, online classes that really ROCK and private consulting. This man really knows his stuff. And see, I didn't even realize it, but he now has a blog for Outlook Tips!
So, whether you work in an office, at home, or are CEO of your family, databases can save your time, money and life! My sister (who has two sets of twins!!) uses her Blackberry all the time and once she learned the power of database management (although she didn't call it that at the time), her life got a lot easier!
(feel free to comment on your experience, Maura!)
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((¸¸.·´ ..·´ Jessica -:¦:-
