About File FX
Welcome to File Fx. We are a marketing resource detailing who works where in the creative service industry. Purpose built for businesses looking to forge close personal relationships with the creative marketplace. Here are some of the sectors we track:-
- Advertising agencies creatives and creative production people
- Graphic design groups designers and production
- Commercial TV production producers and directors
- Publishers art and editorial staff
We are a pure data play - no editorial, no advertising (for now at least), no blogs, no affiliated bolt-on services. All our information is researched, compiled and updated by ourselves. We do not buy in or sell third party lists and take full responsibility for all data supplied. Our work at the coalface involves slogging away over the telephone constantly contacting companies to establish who is where and who does what. Our enviable reputation for accuracy and value comes from keeping our ear to the ground and updating key data every 8 weeks.
All this toil gives us a very accurate database, we guarantee a level of 99%
Who uses us? Practically anyone who offers a creative service, from one-man bands through to FTSE 100 companies. Clients stick with us for years and years, some for 20 years. We do very little advertising, most of our new business is via referrals and word of mouth, if you want a testimonial you will not have to go too far in the creative service industry to discover a File Fx enthusiast.
File FX FAQ
Q. How can I import your data into Mac Address Book, Outlook, Excel, Word or onto a Palm etc?
A. Most modern programmes can import either .CSV or .TXT files. (This function usually sits under an Edit > import menu.) Whatever programme or device you are using it is usually possible to pull in our data although sometimes the process can be quite obscure. To see more on this see our technical FAQ section
Q. How often is information updated?
A. Most data is verified every 8 weeks although some sectors may be on a slower 10-12 week cycle.
Q. How can I find out when a particular sector was last updated?
A. Top London and German Advertising Agencies are updated from the beginning of January, March, May, July, September and November. The update process usually takes about 7 working days. Changes are also made daily. For other update schedules contact us by phone or email.
Q Why is File Fx so interested in what I or my company does?
A. Two reasons. Firstly we only supply the creative service sector. We need to be sure you offer a genuine creative service. Secondly we have different packages for different services. If you select the wrong service pack you may end up with inappropriate companies and inappropriate people.
Q. Do you differentiate between above-the-line, below-the-line, through-the-line, sales promotion, direct-mail, integrated, and marketing advertising agencies?
A. No. If you offer a TV Production service we will only give you agencies with TV clients (including DRTV) If you offer a print based service we give you any agency that has a creative function and there is a choice between top billing and smaller billing agencies.
Q. What is a "mail merge"?
A. Feeding data (such as that supplied by File Fx) onto address labels or creating personalised mailings. To see how to do this in Microsoft Word see our technical FAQ page.
Q. What is your policy regarding provision of email numbers?
A. File Fx does not currently supply email lists for bulk emailing campaigns. Although most of our datasets contain either company level general emails (info@filefx.co.uk) or templates mailto:dick@filefx.co.uk these numbers will not work for bulk emailing as they stand. Even if you make the necessary adaptions "correct" addressess may be blocked as you may be identified as spam or require pre-vetting. Each featured company will operate a different administration policy and this policy is probably regularly altered.
Data Protection law dictates that for us to supply an email to a third party (yourselves) we must have express permission from the individuals concerned. We have made no attempt to seek these permissions (known in the trade as "opt-ins"). The reason for this is not that we are lazy, It is that people on our database have told us they are not interested in receiving unsolicited emails. You are likely to antagonise more people than you interest. Even if we had permissions the law surrounding third party mailings are unclear.
The Privacy in Electronic Communications and Data Privacy Directive passed by the European Parliament means that from October 2003 all email must be "opt in". In other words you must have prior permission from the recipient, if not it is illegal. However providing you give recipients the opportunity to "opt-out" from further mailings (this alone does not technically render your email legal) it is unlikely that an occasional legitimate marketing message will result in a custodial sentence.
TECHNICAL STUFF
WHAT IS MAIL MERGING
Mail merging allows you to create personalised letters, address labels, envelopes or reports. First of all you create a master document and then you link (or merge) that document with a data file (as supplied by File Fx). Microsoft Word is the de facto standard mail merge programme and gives you control over all formatting and data selections
The data file, or data source, is usually a list of names and addresses such as those supplied by File FX either emailed as a CSV or .txt file or downloaded from our site as a csv file. The files will look like this:-
"Bill Smith", "ACME Widgets", "ACME House", "The Street", "The Town", "N1 3DF"
"Fred Jones", "ACME Widgets", "ACME House", "The Street", "The Town", "N1 3DF"
etc, etc.
Each item of text is surrounded by quotation marks, fields are separated by commas and records are on separate lines.
This is the default format for data supplied by File FX since it is supported by almost all programs. Other formats can usually be supplied.
Whether merging data into letters, envelopes or labels the technique is essentially the same. By way of example, a step by step guide to producing a batch of mail merged labels is given below:
MAIL MERGING USING MICROSOFT WORD (WINDOWS)
1. In a new document window, choose Mail Merge from the Tools menu.
2. Under Main Document , choose the "Create" button, and then choose "Mailing Labels".
3. When Word displays a message, choose the "New Main Document" button.
4. Under Data Source, choose the "Get Data" button, and then "Open Data Source".
5. Use the resulting standard files dialog box to either type the name of the file e.g. "A:\FFX.TXT" or navigate to the location of the file and select it. Note that if the latter method is chosen you will need to select "All files (*.*)" from the "List Files of Type" list box.
6. Pick "Set Up Main Document" from the next dialog box and then select the appropriate type of labels.
7. The next dialog box, "Create Labels", will allow you to define the format of the label. For each field required in the label pick the "Insert Merge Field" button. This will present a list of the fields in the first record of the data from which the required one should be selected. Repeat this procedure until all fields have been specified. Note that you can format the label layout in the display box below the "Insert Merge Field" button using spaces, enter and delete keys, punctuation etc. Pick the OK button when the desired layout is complete.
8. Finally, pick the "Merge" button, select any options required e.g. "Records to be merged": "To" and "From" and then pick the "Merge" button. Note that if a more selective merge is required, the query options can be used to filter out unwanted records.
MAIL MERGING USING MICROSOFT WORD (Macintosh)
1. In the new document window (within the Word program), choose Labels from the Tools menu.
2. In the Labels dialogue box, select your Label options before selecting Data Merge.
3. In the Data Merge Manager dialogue box, select Get Data, select Open Data Source - navigate to the location of the file eg File FX text file and select it and click on Open (NB: you will need to select All Files (*.*) from the List Files of Type list box.
4. In the Edit Labels dialogue box, click on Insert Merge Field - this will present a list of the fields in the first record of the data from which the required one should be selected. Repeat this procedure until all fields have been specified. NB: you can format the label layout in the display box below the Insert Merge Field heading, using spaces, Enter and Delete keys, punctuation etc.
5. When the desired layout is complete, select All, Current or Custom and select Merge to New Document (this is located beneath the Merge heading).
6. It is now possible to alter the font, size and styles of the labels to your specification.
Importing FileFx data into Mac Address Book
(must be version V4.0.4 or greater)
Address Book supports "V card" format which File FX cannot directly supply.
However it is possible to import Text Files, these must be .CSV (comma separated variables) format. Either ask File Fx for a .CSV file or if you already have a comma delimited file such as filename.txt, that can simply be copied and renamed filename.csv.
1. File> Import> Text File
2. Navigate to the target file
3. Address Book then displays a window with three panes. The left hand pane allows you to "map the fields", that is to match your Address Book headings with the data file contents. Click on any "do not import" label to assign data to your prefered field heading.
4. Once the first record is satisfactorily organised all subsequent records in the file will follow the same arrangement.
Importing FileFx data into Outlook
Our default csv format can be imported into Outlook. You will need to "map the fields". However we can supply a file with the appropriate layout and header that will import easily.
1. File> Import and Export > follow the prompts in the "import wizard".
Please contact us if you need a file formatted for Outlook
