All around the address

AZ Direct optimizes its services with SAS®

AZ Direct, one of the leading European full-service companies in direct marketing, offers innovative services and high-quality address data, information and information processing from a single source.

AZ Direct was founded in 1966 as an independent subsidiary of Bertelsmann AG and has steadily expanded its position in the market. Beyond the headquarters in Gütersloh, Germany, AZ Direct has European subsidiaries in Austria and Switzerland, and employs more than 600 people.

In addition to the processing of address information for marketing purposes, AZ Direct focuses on the optimization of direct marketing campaigns and the creation of targeted CRM projects through extensive analytical procedures. For example, this may include the prediction of cancellations for cross-selling campaigns. For this purpose, AZ Direct has its own extensive databank system, known as AZ DIAS.

Information on over 35 million households with more than 200 characteristics allows a far-reaching overview of the structure of German households, thus enabling a distinct comparison with the appropriate customer segment.

AZ Direct relies on SAS
"With the help of the flexible and performing SAS software we are in a position to make an optimum database available to our customers for their analytical questioning," says Wolfgang Hüffer, Manager, Market Analysis at AZ Direct. "The possible CRM questions that we can process on the basis of AZ Direct and with the aid of analysis tools provided by SAS are almost limitless."

Based on this well-maintained databank, the analysts at AZ Direct optimize the address content of their customers' target groups round the clock and support their customer relation measures through fine analysis and highly qualified consulting.

AZ Direct uses SAS software in order to supply its customers with target-group-adapted address material for marketing purposes. The example of Viking Flusskreuzfahrten demonstrates the added value that AZ Direct offers its customers with the aid of SAS. Within a few years, Viking has developed into the largest and most successful provider of river cruises in Europe. It operates 25 luxuriously appointed river boats which offer relaxation on rivers like the Rhine, the Volga, the Danube, the Elbe and the Seine. Targeted direct marketing measures should in future contribute to the expansion of its European leader role. AZ Direct supports this venture through the creation of a databank in which interested parties and potential new customers are identified as a result of its analysis. This knowledge enables Viking to contact a targeted address list using advertising tools of varying value.

AZ Direct relies on its databank and on SAS when creating profiles of potential cruise customers: comparison of old Viking customers with the German cross-section – illustrated in AZ DIAS – enables an exact picture of a typical Viking customer to be created.

This profile, defined in a scorecard, can be easily found in the address data held by AZ Direct and is used precisely to acquire new customers.

The aim
The databank that has been created in this way is not a static structure but is the basis for a dynamic process: each response to marketing campaigns already carried out leads to a finer analysis of the profiles and flows into future campaigns.

The project already shows results: "With the aid of the models we have created in line with response monitoring, the response rates of the following campaigns were almost doubled," says Peter Lipp, project leader analysis at AZ Direct.

From the first merging of the characteristics from AZ DIAS with those of the main Viking customers to model creation, SAS is used. Hüffer emphasized the role of SAS within this process: "Only in this way can large amounts of customer data be structured sensibly in connection with AZ DIAS and analyzed expressively."

Whether it is data management, cluster algorithms or regression with SAS, the continuous process from data care to analysis – based on one of the largest consumer databanks in Europe – gives Viking Flusskreuzfahrten the feeling that relations with its customers will be expanded even more strongly. Peter Lipp concludes that, "The targeted addressing not only promotes customer satisfaction, but also unburdens the marketing budget of our customer significantly."

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