>Our organization periodically sends announcement through the mail and >invitations to various events. Different people in our database get >different combinations of mailings, and we would like to keep track of who >has received what. Is there a way to use the Contacts records to keep this >information, without unnecessarily cluttering the source code list (we would >rather not use a custom field for this either)? Are there any options other >than the above?
Each of the output options offers the option to create contact records for that output. The scripts that do that check for a source code and won't proceed without it. You could modify the scripts to eliminate the steps which check for a source code, but that seems pretty complicated. You could export a list of record number at the time you create your mailing labels or letters for a particular invitation, and import them directly into the contacts file, then do several replace operations on the found set to fill in the contact date and type of contact. But, I need to say that I don't think attaching source codes to invitations and announcements is unnecessarily cluttering the source code list. The reason the contact records insist on a source code is that it is very useful. Keeping track of who received what is only half the reason the contacts file exists. The other half is to track the effectiveness of the solicitations you send. Source codes are intended to uniquely identify a solicitation so you can correlate responses to a solicitation and track its effectiveness. When you post an action record that one of your constituents attended an event in response to an invitation, you attach the same source code to the action record as to the invitation. Subsequently, the response analysis will help you decide what solicitations worked - more or fewer reminders, email versus letters, etc., -- -- Dave Shaw H4 Consulting tel: 206-954-7526 fax: 206-625-1338 ------------------ Reminder to each recipient: To change your list account preferences, go to http://email.sparklist.com/scripts/lyris.pl?enter=support and enter the email address you used to subscribe to the ebase support list:: [email protected] To unsubscribe send a blank email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] --------------------------------------------------------------------- ebase - Relationship Management for Nonprofits, http://www.ebase.org ---------------------------------------------------------------------
