Even if your customers or malaysia whatsapp number data
clients want to share an accurate address, they often make mistakes and typos. The most common problems companies encounter with address data are:
- Incomplete Addresses: Missing elements such as street numbers, street names, or postal/ZIP codes.
- Incorrect Spelling: Misspelled street names, city names, or other components of the address.
- Abbreviations: Inconsistent or incorrect use of abbreviations for street types (e.g., “St.” vs. “Street”) or directional indicators (e.g., “NW” vs. “Northwest”).
- Format Variations: Different formats used for the same address (e.g., “123 Main St” vs. “123 Main Street”).
- Missing or Incorrect Postal/ZIP Codes: Lack of postal codes or incorrect codes associated with the address.
- Non-standardized Apartment/Unit Designations: Inconsistent use of apartment, suite, or unit designations (e.g., “Apt”, “Unit”, “Suite”).
How to Standardize Address Data
The data standardization consulting and customization of services process consists of several steps. If you are planning to do it manually, you will have to:
Begin by selecting a standard format for addresses that aligns with the requirements of the postal system in the relevant country. Keep in mind that each country can have its own approach to address standardization.
In the United States, all mailing addresses should follow United States Postal Service (USPS) database standardization. Meanwhile, in the UK, it’s the Royal Mail PAF (Postcode Address File) database.
Next, you need to conduct a thorough analysis of your address data to understand its quality and structure. Identify common issues such as incomplete customer addresses, misspellings, and format variations. This step helps you tailor your standardization process to address the challenges that are commonly present in your data.
Parse Address Data
Break down each lack data address into its individual components, such as street number, street name, city, state/province, and postal/ZIP code. This will prepare data for cleansing and standardization.
You can now clean the data by:
- Correcting errors
- Removing inconsistencies
- Standardizing elements to suit the correct format
This involves correcting misspellings, expanding abbreviations, and ensuring uniformity in formatting across all addresses. Depending on the size of your address book, standardization can turn into a time-consuming process. If you choose to do it with address standardization software, the process will take minutes.
- At the end, you will see which issues prevail. Besides being useful for addressing normalization, this can help you prevent similar problems in the future.