Salutation for business contacts

Aldera Chisholm

For our organizational constituents, if our corporate contact is also in the database as an individual donor, we would link that as we enter them as an organizational contact. 



If I want to mail company x, and Bob Smith is their corporate contact, it will load the Salutation from Bob's personal file, so that it comes up to Bob and Mary Smith, Acme Company, etc.



Is there a suggested way around this? It's very odd to mail someone a piece of mail that is corporate focused, and have it addressed to they and their spouse.



I would hate to just not link Bob to his personal profile, as then we lose a vital piece of information about that donor.



Thanks!

Aldera



 

Michael Langley

Aldera,



We use the Additional Addressees and Salutations and have two types for main contacts: Contact Addressee and Contact Salutation.



In Mail when we pull for letters under Addressee/Salutation Addressee and Salutation for Contact option we select to pull these specific names.

Ann Milkowski

We also link our organizational contacts to their individual donor records if they have one.  On their main record, we created additional Addressee and Salutation types called "Business Addressee" and "Business Salutation" that we use when we want to address something to just the contact and not their spouse, I then use that field in my export.  So for Bob, we would have "Bob and Mary Smith" as his Primary Addressee and then "Bob Smith" as his Business Addressee.  This has worked very well for us; we have a lot of school princiapls that we sometimes want to address as a donor with their spouse, and other times we want to address just them as the contacts for their schools.

Gina Gerhard

Aldera - 



Just a few days ago I posted a reply about the difference between Export and Mail. I think one of the features I mentioned that exists in Mail might solve your issue ---



Here's an example:

• Go to Mail and choose Quick Letters.
• Include the query of records you want to deal with.
• In Fields to include, throw over the fields you want to include (although you'll see later on you're not really going to use them).
• On tab 6: Org Address, choose Mail to contacts and hit the contact Information button.
• Specify the type of contacts you want to include.
• HERE's THE FEATURE:  In text in the bottom of the box, you'll see "If a contact also receives this mailing as an individual" and you have some choices:  Mail to individual address only, Mail to contact address only and Mail to both addresses separately,   
  • This will let you decide if you want to 'push' the mailing over to the contact as an individual, org contact, or mail to both.
• Additionally, now go back to the 1 General tab and in the lower left, you can select 'Create output query'.  
  • Instead of pushing your mailing out of Mail, choose to create an Output Query and you can then use that query in Export to produce a more robust mailing.  But it will have done the decsion-making that you specified as far as how to deal with pulling the contact.
• This is a FANTASTIC feature that's totally hidden in lowly humble Mail and for some reason not in Export.

Hope this helps!

 

JoAnn Strommen

This is the place for using additional addressee and salutation types.  We have add/sal that pull both spouse names and other formats that pull just the individual.  For mailings to contact I pull in an individual format (either formal or informal depending on the situation) into my fields to use/merge in mailings.  Ideally I'd have a sal/add called business contact but didn't start out with that format and since users can not globally add contact add/sal it hasn't been done.  To do it, I need to do an import and just haven't had time to do it.

Aldera Chisholm

JoAnn, I'm not totally sure what you mean - wouldn't you have to have already added that contact type onto a contact to pull it into an export/mailing? I'm not sure how to pull it an individual format, unless it's already been set in Additional Addressee/Salutations? 

JoAnn Strommen

Yes, it has to be already set in Additional Add/Sal.  Doesn't really have anything to do with 'contact type'.



When we enter a contact we link to their existing RE record.  On their personal record, each constituent gets a default set of 10 addressee/salutations.

Formal single add

formal single sal

formal joint add

formal joint sal

informal single add

informal single sal

informal joint add

informal join sal

last name, first name

last name, first names joint

So when record links all those add/sal pull in.  When I set up my mail document or export file for contact add/sal type I select the single informal ones. 



Does that make it clearer or just muddy the waters?

 

Marie Tuhy

I totally feel your pain. We have created additional addresee and salutations for contacts called "Contact Address" and "Contact Salutation" and then set up all the docs to pull those types when running letters...Not sure if it is the best work around but it works for the most part...



Good luck!

Gina Gerhard

JoAnn Strommen:

Yes, it has to be already set in Additional Add/Sal.  Doesn't really have anything to do with 'contact type'.



When we enter a contact we link to their existing RE record.  On their personal record, each constituent gets a default set of 10 addressee/salutations.

Formal single add

formal single sal

formal joint add

formal joint sal

informal single add

informal single sal

informal joint add

informal join sal

last name, first name

last name, first names joint

So when record links all those add/sal pull in.  When I set up my mail document or export file for contact add/sal type I select the single informal ones. 



Does that make it clearer or just muddy the waters?

 

 

JoAnn - We do the same thing, we add a very similar set of default addressee/salutations on all records.



I think what gets confusing here is that in Export, when you pull over an address and you pull over the Contact addressee/salutation - it's going to pull whatever addr/sal is on the contact relationship.  

• If the contact has their own record, this set of addressee/salutations is automatically COMING OVER from their individual record (if they have one).  
• If the contact does not have their own record, it comes from the addressee/salutations that you just enter on the contact relationship.
  • The format of these does not have to be unique for contacts -- on the contact relationship you can just enter the primary addr/sal and the same informal types that you enter for regular records.  You should NOT have to create anything unique called 'Contact Addressee/Salutation".
  • If you turn this contact into a regular record (using the Add this individual as a constituent function), the addr/sals will then just go over to their regular constituent record. 

OK, I know - clear as mud ....!!

 

Aldera Chisholm

So, it sounds like the ideal scenario is to have a special add/sal on all constituents for something like "business contact"  - it would have to go on all constit's even if they don't have a business relationship, so I would default to the HoH being the business contact if we weren't sure, then if we do link them to an organization later, I can edit that.



Now, just have to figure out how to back-wards implement that for all my donors.... 

JoAnn Strommen

Not sure why you would need it on all records. 



But, as you can't globally add add/sal to contact records and you can add them to constituent records that might be the easiest way to get them.  Question is doesn't Mail pull from the contact add/sals listed on business relationship?  Not back to the constituent record.  I'm not sure. 



If it pulls from constituent, you can make a query of records with a business relationship and then take query to Admin > Global Add and add an addressee with selected format.  Need to repeat to add saluation.  I have existing Global Adds formated to do this as I don't include all our add/sal in constituent imports always.



But putting them on each record would bring them into relationships.



Gina, the reason I would need/like an add/sal of business contact as while I usually pull 'single informal' there are a few companies that are family owned and I would like to be able to have it pull "joint informal" but only for those companies, not all orgs receiving the mailing.  Being able to have add/sal of business add/sal would allow me to select appropriate format for those situations.  We're small enough and I know db well enough that I manually just enter spouse or brother/sister's name in their correspondence to their business when needed.  Unless I really have missed something there is no way to specify which add/sal to pull in a mail merge in this situation.

Aldera Chisholm

Sorry JoAnn I meant have it as one of the drop-down fields so it's available to all constit., I phrased that badly.



Yes, ideally, I could just edit it on the person's business relationship, but, when I go into the relationship , it has auto-filled from their individual constituent record and it isn't editable. There may be something buried in settings that pre-determines which add/sal it pulls but I can't find it yet, I'll keep looking. 



When doing it via Mail, or through export, I can choose which add/sal from the inviduals record I wish to use so, I could use that, and then ensure I do all my mailings into two batches - one for individuals, one for companies.

JoAnn Strommen

"there may be something buried in settings that pre-determines which add/sal it pulls but I can't find it yet, I'll keep looking."

The add/sal it pulls in for a contact that has an existing RE record are the add/sal that exist on their personal record. No, it's not editable while on org record.  To edit it, you'd need to go to the individual's record.   Don't know that there are really 'buried pre-sets'.  We use a default set for the ones we want they are fields in new constituent batches.

Tom Klimchak

I am loving this conversation (and have had to go back and look at the RE Mail function more than once)... but we have a scenario which Mail does NOT seem to be able to handle: Stacked Spouse Names



So instead of sending mail to "Mr. Bob Smith and Mrs. Mary Smith" we would send to:



Mr. Bob Smith

Mrs. Mary Smith



I don't see any functions "smart" abilities in Mail which would allow us to only include the Spouse Name when the mailing type is a Home Adress and skip over the spouse fields when the mailing type is a business or corporate address...



Right now we export all our mailing info and then do massive cleanups in Excel.



Yes... Every. Single. Time.



Any ideas would be greatly appreciated.....

JoAnn Strommen

"Any ideas greatly appreciated..."??  Change your addressee procedures.



Why are you going through all that every time instead of using 'Mr. & Mrs. Bob Smith' or 'Bob and Mary Smith'?  Is there a significant reason for your org to want that format that is worth all the time to clean up files every time?  I'd sure fight that one and start documenting all the time just to change a name format that for most people matters little.  (I know for some it does.)



Do you have an addressee format that pulls in "Mr. Bob Smith and Mrs. Mary Smith" as one addressee and you have to go in and delete the 'and' and stack them or how are you even doing the clean up?



Nope, RE / Word doesn't handle stacked addresses and can't tell differences between address types.  It can tell if address comes from an individual record vs. an organization record but that's it. 

 

Tom Klimchak

JoAnn,



Actually, we moved to stacked addresses about 5 years ago after we started receiving complaints about the joined salutations.  We had people complain about the male-centric nature of our mailings and we had people complain about their graduation years either looking silly or being misleading.  Basically, we were getting in trouble for being too "old school" and looking chauvinistic.  When we started to investigate more "modern ways" to adress invitations we invevitably saw that stacking names was much more common and actually preferred by a lot of people.



We used to have things like this:



"Dr. Robert and Mrs. Mary Jones '95 '98M"  (quick, which is the alum?)

or

"Mr. Robert and Dr. Mary Jones '89 & '91M 96"  (starting to look silly... woman has 2 degrees, why isn't she first?)



And then we have a lot of people where we don't know if they're married or not.  They're a couple, they seem to have the same street address, but that's about all we know. 



Clean up with a marriage (or separation) is actually super-easy: we just change the name of one person and don't worry about fixing the saluations on both.  If we have a married couple and only the wife is the alumna then we make HER the head of household and have her husband's name listed second.  We've actually recieved several compliments for this :-)



Each administration has had a slightly different take on this.  Some have preferred the stacked, some have not, but they all understand the thinking behind it.



Ideally I'd like to create something in Crystal Reports which does all this "fixing" for me, but trying to get clean Excel exports from Crystal is something I haven't quite mastered yet...  Soon, Crystal Reports... soon

JoAnn Strommen

Okay having your context it makes more sense.  Post topic was discussing business contacts which really isn't what you're dealing with and the fact that you are with a school.  (Another plug for basic facts to show on post - what org person is with).



Dealing with alumni and years I can see where your add/sal get messy.  Have actually noticed my alma mater change formats through the years.  Have you put a post on the Discovery pages to allow RE to accomodate for stacked add/sal?  I not aware of any way to have RE do what you desire. 



 

Aldera Chisholm

JoAnn Strommen:

"there may be something buried in settings that pre-determines which add/sal it pulls but I can't find it yet, I'll keep looking."

The add/sal it pulls in for a contact that has an existing RE record are the add/sal that exist on their personal record. No, it's not editable while on org record.  To edit it, you'd need to go to the individual's record.   Don't know that there are really 'buried pre-sets'.  We use a default set for the ones we want they are fields in new constituent batches.

 

I think I was wishing for a setting that maybe I just wasn't able to find.



So, am I correct in thinking that when I then do an export to get a mailing list,  I could pull something like: if it's an individual, pull add/sal x and if it's a org, pull add/sal y? I've been exploring knowledgebase but haven't figured out that part yet. 



Thanks for all your help! Sometimes even just talking out the issue helps clarify the potential fixes.



 

Nicole S

I am loving this conversation (and have had to go back and look at the RE Mail function more than once)... but we have a scenario which Mail does NOT seem to be able to handle: Stacked Spouse Names

I would set up an addressee for stacked spouse and set up the formula to be something like "Constiuent name [hard break] Spouse name"  kind of like "Constiuent name and [hard break] Spouse name" but without and.

Nicole S

Aldera Chisholm:

JoAnn Strommen:

"there may be something buried in settings that pre-determines which add/sal it pulls but I can't find it yet, I'll keep looking."

The add/sal it pulls in for a contact that has an existing RE record are the add/sal that exist on their personal record. No, it's not editable while on org record.  To edit it, you'd need to go to the individual's record.   Don't know that there are really 'buried pre-sets'.  We use a default set for the ones we want they are fields in new constituent batches.

 

I think I was wishing for a setting that maybe I just wasn't able to find.



So, am I correct in thinking that when I then do an export to get a mailing list,  I could pull something like: if it's an individual, pull add/sal x and if it's a org, pull add/sal y? I've been exploring knowledgebase but haven't figured out that part yet. 



Thanks for all your help! Sometimes even just talking out the issue helps clarify the potential fixes.



 

 

Go right now to export and look at where you are pulling addressee/salutation -- you shoulod see a button for format (or a right click or whatever) Go into that menu and you will see the option for an indivudual for how to pull the addressee you want.  Or even to have it pull the same system generated addressee for everyone  or the name only.  You should see another tab for organizations.  YOu will not see the addressee options there for org contacts.  You will need to pull another column for the contact addressee and do the same formatting there.



(found by searching "format addressee in export")

How to export a specific addressee format Create a constituent export Export Addressee/Salutation, Addressee In the Output section of the export, highlight the field Addressee and click Format at the bottom of the screen

BB127010

Michelle Alford

@Aldera Chisholm wondering if you ever figured this out? We are having this same issue and it's driving me batty! Every time I run an export with both orgs and individual donors, I end up with salutations for our business contacts that include their spouses names. Makes zero sense! It feels like when I create the contact relationship in RENXT I should be able to just choose the format to use for the contact, but I can't - it defaults to their salutation on their individual record. So annoying!

(Yes, I read this entire thread and I was either thoroughly confused by some of the advice or it didn't really apply/help)

JoAnn Strommen

@Michelle Alford This old chain is a little bit different focus. But if you read response from @Nicole S you can do it. You have to select an add/sal format other than the one which your org has formatted which pulls two names.

Patti Hommes

@Michelle Alford Much the same as @JoAnn Strommen suggested, we added additional add/sals of Contact Addressee and Contact Salutation, which solves the problem for us!