Reading the Marketing Exclusions Report
Sending a marketing effort should always include looking over the marketing exclusions report. While often forgotten, this handy tool can help you determine exactly why you are not picking up as many constituents in your marketing efforts as you expected.
To view the marketing exclusions report, you must first calculate the marketing effort. Once that process is completed, you’ll see the marketing exclusions report under Reports on the left side of your screen. Click on the link then download the report into an Excel spreadsheet to review your data.
The Data tab of the report shows you the constituents’ names, the segment they were excluded from, and most importantly, the Exclusion Reason.
The purpose of the Exclusion Reason column is pretty self-explanatory. Here you’ll be able to view:
- Do Not Email/No University Contact/Other Solicit Codes: Constituents who have opted out of communications or solicitations from your unit or the university
- Address Processing: Constituents who were excluded because they’re missing a valid address or email address
- Included in Previous Segment: Constituents who were technically excluded from a segment because they had already been pulled in by another segment; only occurs when more than one segment is included in the effort.
- Household member in…: Constituents who are already receiving the marketing effort as a member of a household; only occurs with postal marketing efforts.
- Deceased: Constituents whose records are marked as deceased in GAIL
In addition to learning why a specific constituent didn’t receive your marketing effort, this report can assist in planning future communications. For example if you notice that most of the constituents were excluded due to Email Address Processing, it might be worth sending a postal mailing to those constituents. Using the marketing exclusions report to form your communication strategy can minimize costs and maximize the reach of your message.