Building your housefile (list) is one of the key ingredients in developing a strong online presence. It is important to welcome a constant flow of constituents into your online home. But, what are the next steps in maintaining that list? Once you have a good list going, it is vital to keep that list clean, dust and clutter-free. Mom always told you to keep your room clean. Why should your constituent list be any different?

Here are some tips to keeping a clean list:

• Decide on what data you want to collect and how you want it to be organized in your database. For example, if you want to have a field in your database to store information on constituents' pets' names, decide where you want that information to live in the database and how you want to get it there.

• Draw a map. Create a flowchart. Put together some document with all of your database fields and the naming conventions for those fields.

• Make sure all individuals in your organization have that document. This will ensure that everyone in your organization will use the same naming conventions and mapping process when creating the online forms you use to collect constituents' information.

• If you have uniform response options you want to have listed on multiple choice questions (that are going to be used on many of your online forms), decide upon the answer options and make sure everyone in your organization has a document outlining those response options.

• Clean up duplicate records often. If you have the time to do this regularly, it can save you time in the future.

Essentially the most important ingredient to keeping your housefile (list) clean is to dust it regularly. Empower your organization by coming up with a clear and outlined process of how you collect and store your data. Doing so will allow you keep a tidy housefile that is easy to report on and analyze.

Source: Connection Cafe; http://www.connectioncafe.com/post/connectioncafe/build_your_houseand_keep_it_tidy_too.html.