How do you establish a routine for ongoing data cleansing?

Required tools

• Access to edit customer data — And permission to merge entries.

Set up the routine

1. 1.Create views that show the issues

   Customers without an organization number. Contacts without an employer. Records with no activity for two years. Three views cover most needs, and they can be created in half an hour.

2. 2.Set aside a fixed amount of time

   Half an hour a month with a designated person responsible. If it’s not on the calendar, it won’t get done—this is always the first thing to fall by the wayside when something urgent comes up.

Do the job

1. 3.Take the duplicates first

   They cause the most damage. Merge rather than delete, so you retain the history from both.

2. 4.Fill in gaps in the key fields

   The organisation number can be retrieved from the Brønnøysund Register Centre. This can be partially automated, making all subsequent linking easier.

3. 5.Deactivate instead of deleting

   Customers who are no longer active should be removed from the worklists, but their history should be retained. Deactivate them.

4. 6.Note what repeats

   If the same error occurs every month, the cause lies in the registration. Correct it rather than cleaning up after it.