How to Use National Change of Address for Your Business

You know how it is—in the middle of a move, who can remember to update their address with every single organization and business they interact with? If yours is the business that gets overlooked when one of your clients moves, anything you send them will be slowed down. And that’s if they register their new address with the post office—which, hopefully, they will do before you mail your next important communication to them. If you consider that about 8.4% of the total US population moves annually, there is a high possibility that some of the contacts you have in your database will become inaccurate over time.

What happens if you send mail to an outdated address? In the best-case scenario, if you are sending first-class mail and you’ve put a return address on it, your documents may be returned to you to be corrected and manually remailed, or be returned as undeliverable. Then you or your employees will have to take time to find out the current contact information and update your address list. This can mean missed payments or even losing clients.

But there is a secret weapon that saves you from the headache of tracking down customers you’ve lost contact with because of outdated addresses. Or not so secret. Using an NCOA-update service can help you avoid undeliverable documents and stay connected to your clients. DocuSend’s cloud-based mailroom is unique in that it provides just such a service to all clients at no extra charge.

NCOA Update Explained

What does using an NCOA-update service mean? Specialized software runs your contact list through the USPS National Change of Address database, detects records that need an update, and replaces the old addresses with current ones. Using NCOA updates fulfills postal requirements to qualify for presorted mail discount rates. This requires filling out a Service Provider Processing Acknowledgement Form (PAF), which the USPS uses to identify the owners of mailing lists to whom they disclose change-of-address information.

This process reduces the cost of returned invoices and improves the effectiveness of your marketing campaigns by reaching the correct audience.

Print-to-mail companies that do all the printing and distribution for you sometimes offer NCOA services for mailing list updates, but they charge extra or require prepaid contracts for a certain period and a minimum number of address records to be processed, or pieces to be mailed. The cost isn’t worth it for small businesses whose mail volumes are not so large.

What is the cost-effective solution specifically developed for small to medium businesses to keep their mail on track?

Streamline Your Mailing with DocuSend

While other companies charge extra for NCOA services, DocuSend online mailroom users get their mailing lists NCOA updated with no additional charge. There’s nothing for you to do, no PAF form to fill out—this option is applied automatically to any mail you distribute via our print-to-mail service, no matter if you send one document or thousands. No need to sign a contract or meet any quantity requirements!

Businesses just upload their documents online to the DocuSend cloud-based mailroom at any time, select the ink color, paper type, and other needed options, and we print them out, insert them into envelopes, and off they go to the post office. For you the user, the whole process takes no longer than sending an email, saving you hours of manual labor. You will receive a discounted postal rate for presorted mail no matter the quantity, and you will notice you are spending half the cost of organizing your mailing internally.

By completely automating the process, DocuSend gets rid of the need to pay for manual labor, stock materials, and make post office runs. Addresses are formatted to meet USPS standards, and mailing is compliant with USPS automation requirments, which means delivery is substantially faster. Invoices that get to the client faster can get paid sooner, and that’s good for your cash flow!

The DocuForward feature is one more advantage businesses get when they use DocuSend as their online mailroom.

How the DocuForward NCOA Service Helps Your Business

Our DocuForward service provides address updates before printing your documents: Our software captures your mailing addresses and runs them through the NCOA database, comparing them to changes of address registered with the past 48 months, and updates them if needed. Your mail is forwarded to the new, correct address.

Here are some of the advantages DocuForward gives you:

• It reduces undeliverable mail. The DocuForward NCOA service ensures that your mail is delivered to the most recent address. This helps reduce the amount of undeliverable mail returned to you.
• It improves response rates. Recipients are more likely to open and respond to mail that is addressed to them correctly.
• It improves your bottom line. You don’t want to waste time, materials, and postage on mail that will not arrive at its destination. DocuForward helps ease your postage and printing budget. And the speedier invoice delivery we mentioned improves your cash flow.
• It helps maintain positive customer relationships. Clients are more likely to appreciate and respond to mail that is relevant and timely.
• It’s always available. Some communications need to be sent urgently, without waiting for a certain time when there will be enough pieces to qualify for NCOA service and the presorted discount on your own. Our service is always there for you.
• It helps you keep your database up to the minute. After the program makes updates and your pieces are printed, you are notified via email and in your personal report portal that the address was updated and can make corrections to your database.

As an added bonus…

Use a Client Move to Boost Your Business

When DocuForward informs you of address changes, you can use the information in a variety of ways. Get creative! Here are a few ideas to jump-start your thinking:

• If you are, for example, an HOA, a lawn or pool care service, a utility, or a refuse collector, follow up with a client who has moved away from your service area but didn't tell you, so you can finalize their account.
• If they closed out their account before they left, sending them a note thanking them for their business and wishing them well in their new location is a nice, personal touch and will encourage them to tell their friends and family at their old location about you.
• If a faithful client moves to an area where you offer services but don't have a lot of clients, offer them a referral credit to get a foothold in that area. Incentives could take the form of free services or a discount.
• If you have an online store, let them know they can still purchase your products or services from anywhere they live.
• And don’t forget to send a colorful flyer to the old address offering a new-customer bonus. The new homeowner will have enough on their plate with the recent move that they will appreciate not having to scout around for available products and services.

Can you think of more ideas? Share them in the comment section.

DocuForward offers significant cost savings for businesses of all sizes. It can help your clients avoid missing your important communications and save your business valuable time that can be spent on other important tasks instead of tracking down clients that moved. Among the other DocuSend services included for every user are address clean-up and reformatting, a tracking service called Mail Trail, and a personal portal that stores all your mailing history and expenses for the last six months. Easily send your paper mail right from your desktop with DocuSend, and our automatic NCOA update feature will help you stay in touch with your clients!