Introduction to database design.

A database can be a powerful tool when designed correctly and efficiently. The entire idea around having a efficient database is so it can be applied in many different ways, with little or no alterations in the actual data itself.

Why use a table?

The difference between a block style database, and a table based database is that in the table based database, data can be sorted, altered and retrieved much easier than a block style.

Plan your database before creating.

The first step in creating your database scheme, whether it be in Excel, Access ,or any other table based database software is to make a list of what you need to store to make a complete database. For the purposes of this tutorial, we will be creating a database to be used for direct mailing purposes.

Take into consideration

If you were to handwrite an address block on an envelope, you would probably include a name, address, and city, state, zip. This is fine, if that's all you needed to get the envelope to its destination, but in the case of a database, that is a bare minimum, and anything less would be inadequate. When creating a database, you have to take into consideration of all the possible pieces of data that may or may not be included with each record you plan on entering; Meaning, remember to leave room to expand or to put additional data if needed. If you know that segmenting the list (by respondents, county, donor amount or last contact for example) will let you save money by mailing to the right "targeted" people, be sure to have columns available for this information.

Lets begin.

First and foremost, each record should have a unique identifier assigned to it. In our case, we will use an incremental number, starting from 1 up to however many records will be entered into the database.

Forming a contact block.

The next column over, following the index field, we start to label the fields according to what data will be entered in that column: Company Name, First Name, Middle Initial, Last Name, Title. These fields will be called the Contact Block. These may be all you will need to have a well organized, Contact Block, but you can name them best to fit your database.

Forming a address block.

On to the Address block. Since we are designing a direct mailing database, there needs to be fields that will get the piece to its destination. The same method applies:; take into consideration of any combinations of addresses, suites, apartments, or any other needed data, when creating and labeling your fields. We will use a basic address block consisting of: Address1, Address2, City, State, and Zip. This will be more than enough to cover most of the United states, and can be easily upgraded to a International database by adding a Country Field, and a Country Zip Code field, remembering to use one or the other, to keep the database efficient.

Done!

At this point you have a pretty well formed database, that can be used to keep your direct mailing lists efficient, and organized, but as most databases do, you will probably have a few miscellaneous fields at the end, I recommend 3 fields to be created for future notes, or perhaps phone number, or email addresses. This is up to the database designer to judge if these are appropriate for your database.