[thelist] writing a productive search query

Brooking, John John.Brooking at sappi.com
Wed Mar 2 08:28:50 CST 2005


Brian said:
> I appreciate the time John.  Without going to the Hash setup, and 
> just using a query, do you think its possible with a certain 
> amount of accuracy to get at LEAST the correct result, and a 
> couple other possibilities?

Well, really, I'd have to put some more thought into it. I think your
points are all valid. One way to get your mind around it might be to lay
out a spreadsheet of all the possible combinations of things that could
change. Make a column for each data item, then in the rows underneath
that, lay out all combinations of Changed/Unchanged, then consider for
each combination, the likelihood of that combination occurring, and the
best way to identify them in that case. Ranking the likely combinations
of changes and the strategies for those might help you get your mind
around a strategy. What you're looking for is not something that is
guaranteed to work 100% of the time, because I don't think that's
attainable, but something that will work the highest percentage of the
time. I'm sure you've probably thought of all this, but if you haven't
laid it out exhaustively like this, it might help advance your thinking
further.

Is it an option to just have the phone rep ask the caller if any of
their information has changed since they subscribed? Not that they will
always remember exactly when they subscribed, but it would be an
important clue to the phone rep.

Good luck! I'd be interested in hearing what you finally come up with!

- John
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