Do Not Call (DNC) Lists
The Do Not Call Lists tab/ page (Fig. 1) allows the user to select all the 'user generated' Do Not Call (DNC) lists which pertain to the campaign.
Fig. 1 - Do Not Call Lists - Web Client
Softdial Campaign Manager™ can cross reference every number in your contact database against multiple DNC lists. Therefore, separate lists (such as country-wide, state-wide, company-specific and campaign-specific) can be mixed and matched as necessary for a given campaign.
From V10.6.496 - new rules have been introduced for number validation in Softdial Campaign Manager™. See below.
New rules for number validation - further details
The new rules affect numbers
- being added to the Softdial Campaign Manager™ internal DNC list from file
- before a DNC lookup occurs
- before they are sent to Softdial CallGem™.
The new validation procedure is
- Leading spaces are removed
- If the first char is a '+' it is replaced with the International Access code defined in the IDDCode registry setting (see Registry Settings)
- All other non digits (i.e. anything other than 0-9) are removed
#2. and #3. are performed so that the length validation can be carried out on the true number
- Absolute length limit on this 'digitised' number is 18 digits
This is due to the DNC lookup and comparison. Using int64, anything over 18 digits will be truncated and will appear as the same number. Previously, any number containing a non-digit would be handled such that only the most significant portion of the number up to the first non-digit would be used, i.e. '0123456|789' would become '0123456'.
This procedure is purely for validation purposes. The stored numbers are not modified, i.e. they will remain in the database in the original format.
In the case of numbers being sent to Softdial CallGem™, the steps 1 thru 3 are now applied prior to checking against maximum length. However, the numbers are sent to Softdial CallGem™ in their original format.
If length validation fails and
- this is for DNC insertion from file - the number is not inserted and an error is logged.
- this is a DNC lookup - to err on the side of caution, the number is reported as DNC and an error is again logged.
From V10 - DNC processing is enabled for every campaign. Every campaign has its own system generated DNC list managed by Softdial Campaign Manager™ Server. This enables the Dynamic Do Not Call feature. See Do Not Call (DNC) Data Import for further details.
In Fig. 1, note that the tenant and campaign system generated DNC lists (.sdc extension) do not appear in the Unselected lists panel. This is because the system generated lists are processed automatically when the campaign is started.
About DNC processing
- These settings will only be enabled if the Results Primary Table and Switch Results Column properties are selected in the Database Output tab/ page.
- DNC cleaning depends upon appropriately formatted DNC list files having been placed in the correct folder on the server in advance. See Do Not Call (DNC) Data Import for further information.
- The effect of processing a DNC list is to populate the switch_result column of the campaign table with 100. Once this has been done, the only way to clear this again is to run an SQL query on the table to reset the value to null. Resetting the campaign tables using the Softdial Campaign Manager™ Client Campaign menu command does not reset these records. Neither does deselecting the DNC list and restarting the campaign. For this reason, the DNC lists should not be used to exclude records from a campaign temporarily. Instead, Data Selection (Filters) should be used for this purpose.
Managing DNC lists
Upon first entering this tab/ page (Fig. 1), the left hand listbox shows all the lists available to the campaign, but which are currently not selected for the campaign.
To select/ unselect DNC lists
To assign as
- Selected - drag and drop a list from the left panel to the right panel
- Unselected - drag and drop from right to left
Multiple lists can be selected using the (Windows standard) SHIFT and CTRL keys
New DNC lists can only be selected when the campaign is stopped.