Organisations often collect or buy prospect data to use for campaigns.
In most cases these prospects are stored in the CRM system and only the indicator “Prospect” distinguishes them from customers.
The same occurs with ex-customers who will remain in the CRM system although there is no contact anymore.
Prospects and ex-customers both have the same problem that their data is hardly maintained. Due to job changes the data usually already gets outdated after a year.

What’s the value of these data?
In my opinion data that is not maintained is useless, since no one will be able to tell whether
- the person still lives on the same address
- his interests are still the same
- the person is still working for the company
- his job title is still the same
- the company is still located at the address
- the company has been merged or acquired

Enrichment and validation based on external data sources might solve these issues. The question is whether the value is worth the effort.
In all cases when these data are not maintained internally or externally I would recommend to delete prospect data from the CRM-system after a year of inactivity.
For ex-customers the case is a little different since legal regulations force organisations to keep data available for many years. But when using ex-customer’s data one should be aware of the fact that these data might be outdated as well.

I am interested in your opinion or how you handle these issues.