Prospect profiles
This feature is available in the Direct Marketing option.
This technique uses results from a previous or test campaign to create descriptive profiles. You can use the profiles to target specific groups of contacts in future campaigns. The Response field indicates who responded to the previous or test campaign. The Profiles list contains the characteristics that you want to use to create the profile.
Example. Based on the results of a test mailing, the direct marketing division of a company wants to generate profiles of the types of customers most likely to respond to an offer, based on demographic information.
Output
Output includes a table that provides a description of each profile group and displays response rates (percentage of positive responses) and cumulative response rates and a chart of cumulative response rates. If you include a target minimum response rate, the table will be color-coded to show which profiles meet the minimum cumulative response rate, and the chart will include a reference line at the specified minimum response rate value.
Prospect Profiles data considerations
Response Field. The response field must be nominal or ordinal. It can be string or numeric. If this field contains a value that indicates number or amount of purchases, you will need to create a new field in which a single value represents all positive responses. See the topic Creating a categorical response field for more information.
Positive response value. The positive response value identifies customers who responded positively (for example, made a purchase). All other non-missing response values are assumed to indicate a negative response. If there are any defined value labels for the response field, those labels are displayed in the drop-down list. See the topic Value labels for more information.
Create Profiles with. These fields can be nominal, ordinal, or continuous (scale). They can be string or numeric.
Measurement level. Correct measurement level assignment is important because it affects the computation of the results.
- Nominal. A variable can be treated as nominal when its values represent categories with no intrinsic ranking (for example, the department of the company in which an employee works). Examples of nominal variables include region, postal code, and religious affiliation.
- Ordinal. A variable can be treated as ordinal when its values represent categories with some intrinsic ranking (for example, levels of service satisfaction from highly dissatisfied to highly satisfied). Examples of ordinal variables include attitude scores representing degree of satisfaction or confidence and preference rating scores.
- Continuous. A variable can be treated as scale (continuous) when its values represent ordered categories with a meaningful metric, so that distance comparisons between values are appropriate. Examples of scale variables include age in years and income in thousands of dollars.
An icon next to each field indicates the current measurement level.
| Numeric | String | Date | Time | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Scale (Continuous) |  |
n/a |  |
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| Ordinal |  |
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| Nominal |
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You can change the measurement level in Variable View of the Data Editor (for more information, see Specifying Measurement Level) or you can use the Define Variable Properties dialog to suggest an appropriate measurement level for each field (for more information, see, Assigning the Measurement Level).
Fields with unknown measurement level
The Measurement Level alert is displayed when the measurement level for one or more variables (fields) in the dataset is unknown. Since measurement level affects the computation of results for this procedure, all variables must have a defined measurement level.
Scan Data. Reads the data in the active dataset and assigns default measurement level to any fields with a currently unknown measurement level. If the dataset is large, that may take some time.
Assign Manually. Opens a dialog that lists all fields with an unknown measurement level. You can use this dialog to assign measurement level to those fields. You can also assign measurement level in Variable View of the Data Editor.
Since measurement level is important for this procedure, you cannot access the dialog to run this procedure until all fields have a defined measurement level.
To obtain prospect profiles
This feature is available in the Direct Marketing option.
From the menus choose:
- Select Generate profiles of my contacts who responded to an offer.
- Select the field that identifies which contacts responded to the offer. This field must be nominal or ordinal.
- Enter the value that indicates a positive response. If any values have defined value labels, you can select the value label from the drop-down list, and the corresponding value will be displayed. See the topic Value labels for more information.
- Select the fields you want to use to create the profiles.
- Click Run to run the procedure.
See the Data Considerations section above for more information on the response field and measurement level.