Order History Report

The Order History report provides an view of the number of orders received over a period of time. By default it shows you new orders only, but it can show you renewal orders too. The monthly version of the report displays the numbers of orders received each month in a matrix where the columns are months and the rows are years. The weekly version of the report shows you the number of orders received week by week in nine columns—orders received before nine weeks ago are shown in a separate "earlier" column.

There are a large number of sorting and filtering options available. You can get counts broken out by publication, marketing plan, list, channel, package and tracking code. You can get two-way breakdowns by any of the preceding fields plus order source, service code, premium, term, price and subscription agency. This can be useful in a number of ways. Suppose you raised your prices last year—you could get a report that showed you the number of orders received at the old and new prices and compare the numbers. Or you could request a report sorted by subscription agency and compare the number of orders received from each agency, over time.

Of course, the raw number of orders received does not tell the whole story. It is also important to know how much revenue is being generated by those orders. If you accept bill-me orders it also important to know how many of those unpaid orders become paid. To answer those questions you should run the Payment Rate report.

General tab:

Primary sort, Secondary sort

The 'Order history' report may be sorted at two levels. The primary sort breaks out orders by attributes of the subscription—channel, tracking code, list, and so forth. Within this main category, you can request a secondary sort by attributes of the order itself—order source, premium, term, price and so forth. Regardless of how you sort the data, QuickFill will display the data organized by month or by week, depending on your choice in the 'Report format' radio buttons.

by Publication

This produces a simple report broken down by publication. It is the default sort order. Note that even if you select one of the other sort orders the results will always include a top level breakout by publication.

by Original channel

Sorting by the channel code entered when the original order was created allows you to separate orders by the channels you defined such as direct mail, telephone, or fax. Or, if you are using the channel code to identify salespeople you could request a report sorted by channel to show you how many sales were generated by each salesperson by month or week.

by Marketing plan

This version shows you the orders received broken down by marketing plan. Use it to see the effects of promotional campaigns you have made over time.

by List

The 'by List' version shows you the orders received broken down by the list used in the original mailing. It will provide finer detail than sorting by 'Marketing Plan.'

by Tracking code

This version shows you the orders received broken down by tracking code. Use this report to see the effects over time of very specific sources—for example, orders you got from the Business Week mailing list using a pink marketing package and a Swiss Army knife premium. As a rule, you'll want to break down your report by tracking codes only when you need to analyze orders from quite specific sources.

by Package

This version shows you the order history for orders broken down by marketing package. For example if you are running a test on the effectiveness of two different packages it might show you how many orders you received each month from the large format package compared to the number you received from the smaller but brightly colored package.

by Order channel

This is the same as the 'Original channel' sort order except that it uses the channel code of the order record instead of the subscription record. These codes will differ only if you include renewal orders in the report.

by Order source

The source code of a new order is the same as the tracking code of the subscription. The source code of a renewal order is its renewal effort code. A report that uses the 'Order source' sort sequence will be the same as one using the 'Tracking code' sequence unless you include renewal orders in the report.

by Order service

Service codes are typically used to identify the means of delivery of the subscription. You might use codes to distinguish postal, fax or e-mail delivery or to identify subscribers that requested special services. By requesting a report sorted by the order service you can see the proportion of orders that requested each of the available services. This can useful in identifying trends over time as subscribers migrate from one service to another.

by Premium

Sorting by the premium requested allows you to see how many orders you received that requested each of the premiums that you offer. For example you may have recently sent out a test mailing where half of the pieces offered a digital clock and the other half did not. If you request a weekly order history report sorted by premium you can compare the number orders came in each week with and without the clock.

by Term

Sorting by the term of the order allows you to see the relative numbers of orders at each term length. You can compare the number of short term trials against the number of one and two year subscriptions.

by Price

Sorting by the price of the order lets you compare the relative number of orders at each price level. For example you might compare the number of discounted subscriptions ordered by students against the number of regularly priced subscriptions.

by Agency

Sorting by subscription agency can be very useful in comparing the amount of business brought in by the various agencies that you deal with.

Monthly, weekly

Choose whether you want a monthly or a weekly report. The monthly report shows you how many new orders you received each month for as long a period as you like.

The weekly report shows you how many new orders you received in the most recent nine weeks. By adjusting the 'order date' fields on the filter, you can examine any nine weeks of new order history.

Subscriptions, Copies

Select 'Copies' if you have group or bulk subscriptions for large numbers of copies so that you will get a more accurate picture of your orders. Otherwise, select 'Subscriptions'.

New orders only, Renewal orders only, Both combined, Both listed separately

By default the report will only include new orders. Using these radio buttons you can choose to report renewal orders instead, or both kinds of orders. If you choose 'both' then you can either have the combined number of new and renewal orders reported on a single line or you can have the new and renewal orders listed separately, with a separate total line.

Internet orders

Select 'Include' if you would like to include orders entered on the Internet and imported using the QuickFill Internet extension, 'Exclude' if you would like to exclude Internet orders, or 'Only' if you would like to produce a report only with Internet orders. This field is only active for QFIE customers.

Order date range

Leave the 'Order date' fields as they are, and your report will include the last five years of orders. You can change the date range by right clicking the 'Order date range' field and selecting the appropriate range. If you wish to use a specific range of dates, select the 'Custom dates' range and enter the dates in the date fields.

Click here for more information about Filter screens and Options for running reports.