I just got a bomb dropped on me. Evidently my employer wants to market
to not only people, but companies. I had made a good ERD, and API for
marketing to People, including names, addresses, phone numbers, email
addresses, etc. I don't know how to do companies. I figure that
someone else out there must have run into the same problems. Surely
somone has company info in a database somewhere.

Problems:
1) How can you uniquely identify a company?
I figured a taxID would be good, but we don't have access to that.
We get forms in with company name and
address. Problem with names is someone could write down, "I work
for J&B Inc." while another writes
down, "I work for Johnson and Buchman Inc." Same problem with
addresses, but to a lesser degree.
2) I've already got an ERD for People, with names table, addresses
table, phone numbers table, email table, etc.
A company probably has all the same data. I would like to be able
to use the same tables for a company, but
am unsure how to do it. (wish I could just post my ERD). Thing is,
a person "works for" a company too.
So, I've got
"prospects" that are "people" or "companies"
"people that work for "companies"
and several data tables containing addresses, names, phone
numbers, etc. that both "people"and "companies" have"
I don't know how to link the names, addresses, phone numbers,
email addresses to both people _and_ companies.

"cpisz" <christopherpisz (AT) gmail (DOT) com> wrote

A Universal Person and Organization Data Model
http://www.tdan.com/view-articles/5014/

--
David Portas

DUNS number and an ISO size code of 9. You migth want to look at my
book on Standards.

On Feb 27, 7:15*pm, --CELKO-- <jcelko... (AT) earthlink (DOT) net> wrote:
Looked up "DUNS" and it appears it is an ID assigned by a company to
uniquely identify companies. However, I'd require some means of
getting the number based on a name and an address, I don't think my
superiors would agree to pay a fee for each one... Is there som public
means of look up?

On Mon, 1 Mar 2010 13:56:22 -0800 (PST), cpisz
<christopherpisz (AT) gmail (DOT) com> wrote:

I had to get one years ago when I started doing freelancing work
for Eaton's (a former department store chain in Canada). There was no
charge, and it was just a phone call, but I was the one to do it.
Eaton's could force it on me since I wanted to get paid, but that may
not work for you. ("force" is a rather strong word, but their
payables operated by DUNS.)

Sincerely,

Gene Wirchenko

David Portas wrote:
Computers have never been very hot at handling the human notion of `or`
(nor the logical one). Developers have always been good at showing a
lack of discipline in the face of wishful thinking by their employers.
A number of popular press authors have seized on and profited by, the
human failings.

On 2010-02-28, --CELKO-- <jcelko212 (AT) earthlink (DOT) net> wrote:
What is it that differentiates companies for you?
(email( | phone | fax | postal?) address of the purchasing dept?)

DUNS looks like a single point of failure that's beyond your control.

If you want to market to a company and that company is not found in
the DUNS search (which seems to be broken for most contries) there's
nothing you can do.

Do you have a plan to handle mergers, takeovers, demergers, etc. or does the
database have a finite lifesopan?


--- news://freenews.netfront.net/ - complaints: news (AT) netfront (DOT) net ---

All standards are "beyond your control"; do you invent your own postal
codes? Or do you use an external authority that maintains it for
you?

Since I was one of those companies, your client tells you to get a
DUNS. It is free, after all. I don't think you have an idea of how
Universal the DUNS is. The US Government requires it as does the EU.
The DUNS database has over 100 million entries for businesses
throughout the world. You might want to Google a for a quick overview:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DUNS_NUMBER
http://www.dnb.com/us/duns_update/

The whole point is that the I do NOT handle it! I have an external
authority for verification that does all the work for over 100 million
entries without my lifting a finger. Same idea as a postal code, only
more international.

On 2010-03-06, --CELKO-- <jcelko212 (AT) earthlink (DOT) net> wrote:
"get a DUNS code so we can send you advertising material"
I can't see that having a high success rate.

the website didn't work when I tried it, in particular the "go to your
country's site" part.

that's about 1/3 of the worlds population

It'd be stretching the truth to call it global,
and yet you claim it's universal?

so no check digits


--- news://freenews.netfront.net/ - complaints: news (AT) netfront (DOT) net ---

When I buy a commercial mailing list these days, I get the NAICS codes
(http://trial.selectory.com/lp/google...cs-codes.html?
registrationcode=goog0340&LeadDest=DNB) which leads me to the DUNS
numbers.


Since 80% of the world's population lives on less than $10 per day,
they are not a great market (http://www.globalissues.org/article/26/
poverty-facts-and-stats). Gee, I guess we will not get flyers and our
products to the Amazon headhunter villages that are on the Internet,
trying to sell their traditional goods

That one really bothers me. I bitched this problem in passing in one
of my books, where I urge DB designers to always make codes long
enough to allow growth. Nobody expected the DUNS to grow like that,
especially with the fall of the Soviet empire and the opening of China
Capitalism.

Likewise, the VIN system is undergoing changes because of growth.

Hey, maybe there is a good article on this in the making!