Must-read for foreign trade customer acquisition: base material screening checklist (6-step verification number validity)

Friends who are engaged in foreign trade customer acquisition, cross-border e-commerce or social media operations must have heard the term “base material screening”. To put it simply, base material screening is to conduct a comprehensive “physical examination” of the number list in your hand before sending private messages in batches, joining groups, and sending marketing information - verifying which numbers have been activated, which have been active recently, and which belong to the target gender and age. The consequences of direct delivery without screening the base materials are very typical: the budget is spent on a large number of empty accounts, the conversion rate is lowered, and even the platform risk control bans accounts due to abnormal contact.

This article provides a base material screening checklist that can be directly applied, covering the entire process from number deduplication to exporting results. Combined with number screening tools such as KK-DATA, it can help you filter out invalid numbers at the lowest cost, so that every budget can be spent on real users.

What is base material screening? Why is this step necessary before launching?

Basic screening (also known as “number cleaning”, “number screening”) refers to: using professional tools to batch detect which social platforms (Telegram, WhatsApp, Line, Zalo, etc.) the phone number has been registered on, whether it is active, and the user’s gender, age and other basic portrait fields. The final output is a list with annotations - which numbers can be used directly for marketing and which should be simply discarded.

Three major risks of not screening base materials

Risk	Specific Performance	Consequences
Waste of budget	Sending messages to empty or unregistered numbers, each message is billed (such as SMS, IM interaction)	Low conversion rate, extremely poor ROI
Lower the weight of the account	If a large number of messages fail to be sent or no one reads them, the platform determines that the account is harassing	Account flow is limited and banned
Unable to accurately target	No distinction between men and women, unknown activity levels, the delivery effect is like blind typing	A waste of time, missing real customers

Therefore, base material screening is a “filtering station” that cannot be omitted in the customer acquisition process**.

Base Screening Checklist: 6 Key Steps

Here’s a 6-step checklist you can jump right into. Executed in order to minimize the consumption of invalid numbers.

Step 1: Deduplicate number sources - avoid wasting balances through repeated detection

Many teams collect numbers from multiple sources (website registrations, trade show business cards, CSV exports from partners) and when combined there is often a lot of duplication. If duplication is not removed, the same number will be submitted for testing multiple times, and the balance will be deducted in vain.

Operation Suggestions:

• Merge all number files into one CSV and remove duplicate rows (use the Excel/Google Sheets “Remove Duplicates” feature).
• Use KK-DATA’s [Data Deduplication Warehouse] (https://docs.kkdata.cc/) function: the platform will automatically identify duplicate numbers across tasks to avoid repeated deductions.
• If you have already removed duplicates, it is still recommended to upload it to the duplicate warehouse before submitting the task, because there may be duplicates in different batches.

Step 2: Filter by target platform - confirm which platform the number is activated/valid on

The target user groups of different customer acquisition platforms vary significantly. For example:

• Telegram: suitable for currency circles, technology communities, and foreign trade practitioners
• WhatsApp: covering the world, especially Southeast Asia, Latin America, and Africa
• Line: Mainstream in Japan, Taiwan, and Thailand
• Zalo: Vietnam Core

You can’t guess what platform a user uses just by the location of their number. It is necessary to actually detect the “activation status” of the number on the target platform.

Operation Suggestions:

• Select the corresponding platform in the screening tool (such as Telegram activation detection, WhatsApp activation detection).
• The result will return “Activated” or “Not activated”. Only keep the activated numbers and proceed to the next step.

Step 3: Activity detection - filtering silent users

Activation does not mean active. Many numbers are registered with WhatsApp or Telegram but have not been online for months or even a year. Sending messages to these users has a very low open rate and can easily trigger the platform’s anti-harassment mechanism.

Operation Suggestions:

• Select the “Activity Detection” option and specify a time window (e.g. “Active within 7 days” or “Active within 30 days”).
• Select the window according to your marketing rhythm: if you want to do immediate promotion, choose within 7 days; if it is brand cultivation, 30 days is also acceptable.

Tip: Activity detection on some platforms (such as Telegram) can also return the user’s approximate gender, age (such as age group) and other information to help further filtering.

Step 4: Secondary filtering by population characteristics (gender/age/region)

This step is important if your product has obvious gender differences (such as beauty, men’s clothing), or if you want to target a certain age group (such as around 30 years old). Some screening tools, such as KK-DATA, provide gender detection and age fields.

Operation Suggestions:

• Check the “Gender” and “Age” fields in the task configuration.
• Note: The age field is a range estimate (such as “about 30 years old”), not an ID-level accuracy, but it is sufficient for marketing targeting.

Step 5: Export useful fields and clean the data

After filtering is complete, export the results. Don’t just export the number, but also include key fields: activation status, active time, gender, age, platform-specific ID (such as tgid, wsid, uid). These IDs can be used for subsequent targeted outreach (such as sending messages via the Telegram API).

Operation Suggestions:

• Export to CSV for further analysis using Excel or data processing tools.
• Delete unactivated or inactive lines and only keep the “reachable” list.

Step 6: Import the marketing system in batches and monitor feedback

Finally, import the filtered numbers into your marketing tools (such as private message robots and mass sending scripts), and set up monitoring indicators: sending success rate, open rate, and conversion rate. If the conversion rate of this batch of numbers is still low, it means that the filtering conditions may be too loose (for example, the active window is too long) and need to be adjusted.

Key points for screening base materials on different platforms (Telegram / WhatsApp / Line / Zalo)

The detection fields and precautions for each platform are different, which are explained below.

Telegram filter number: activated + active + gender and age fields

Core fields:

• tg activation: registration test
• tg active: You can specify the last 7 days/30 days online
• tg Gender: Returns gender (some also have an age field, used to filter people around 30 years old)

Note:

• Telegram’s gender and age detection is based on behavioral data inference and is not absolutely accurate, but it can meet marketing targeting.
• Exporting tgid can be used in Telegram API to accurately send messages, which is more reliable than simply using a mobile phone number.

WhatsApp screening number: focus on verifying whether the number is valid

WhatsApp activity is highly correlated with activation status. Since WhatsApp numbers are bound to mobile phone numbers and most users are always online, “valid” means there is a high probability of being active**.

Core fields:

• Activation Test: Whether the number is registered with WhatsApp
• Activity Detection: Whether you have been online recently (available on some platforms)
• wsid: WhatsApp internal ID, can be used in marketing system

Note:

• WhatsApp has strict template review for commercial messages. After screening, you still need to pay attention to compliance when sending.

Line filter number: covering Japan, Taiwan, and Thailand

Line has a high user density in parts of East and Southeast Asia. When filtering, focus on:

• Line activation: whether the number is registered Line
• Line active: whether you have used Line recently
• Line Gender: Can be used to target male/female users

After exporting the uid, it can be used in Line’s official API or third-party marketing tools.

Zalo screen size: for the Vietnamese market

Zalo is Vietnam’s number one social platform. Zalo screens usually require detection of:

• Zalo activation: whether to register or not
• Zalo Active: Last login time
• Gender: suitable for orientation

The Vietnamese market especially needs to pay attention to activity because Zalo users switch numbers frequently.

How to evaluate the data quality after screening the base materials?

After the screening is completed, the quality of the number list you get can be measured by several indicators:

Indicator	Calculation formula	Description
Activation rate	Number of activated numbers ÷ Total number of numbers × 100%	Reflects the “cleanliness” of the original number pool. If it is less than 30%, it means the source is of poor quality
Activity rate	Number of active numbers ÷ Number of activated numbers × 100%	Measure the recent online status of users, generally hope to be greater than 50%
Gender ratio	Number of males/females ÷ number of actives	Verify whether it matches the target population
Platform distribution	Proportion of numbers on each platform	Helps determine which platform is more suitable for main placement

Reference Threshold (can be adjusted according to your own budget):

• Excellent: Activity rate > 70%
• Good: 40% – 70%
• Needs improvement: < 40%

If the activity rate is too low, it is recommended to check whether the activity window is too narrow, or the original number pool itself is zombie data.

Common mistakes in base material selection and pitfall avoidance guide

1. Use the same batch number for repeated testing Error: I found that the screening results of a certain platform were not good, and I used the same number pool to test another platform, and the result was repeated deductions.
   Correct approach: Submit multi-platform joint detection at one time (if the tool supports it), or use a deduplication warehouse to avoid duplication.

2. Ignore data deduplication Error: Multiple files were merged and submitted directly, and a large number of duplicate numbers were deducted.
   Correct approach: After merging, remove duplication first, and then use the deduplication warehouse for secondary duplication prevention.

3. Only look at activation but not activity Error: Filter out all activated numbers and send them directly. After the results are sent, there is a large number of no responses.
   Correct approach: Activity detection must be added as a filter condition.

4. Excluding balance consumption Mistake: I submitted hundreds of thousands of items at once when I saw that the unit price was cheap, but I didn’t know the unit price until my balance was exhausted.
   The correct approach: Submit thousands of small tests first, estimate the actual cost, and then submit on a large scale.

FAQ

Question: How many numbers can be submitted at one time for base material screening?

Answer: The upper limit for a single task is about 1 million, which is subject to the console. If your number exceeds 1 million, you can submit it in batches and use the deduplication warehouse to avoid repeated deductions.

Question: How to calculate the balance deducted from base material screening?

Answer: Different platforms and different detection types (activated, active, gender, etc.) have different unit prices. Before submitting the task, the console will display the estimated cost, and the actual deduction will be based on the accurate result after the task is completed. Please check the console directly for real-time prices and do not rely on third-party estimates.

Q: What fields can be exported from the filtered numbers?

Answer: Depending on the platform, the fields that can be exported include: activation status, active time, gender, age, avatar, tgid/wsid/uid, etc. The specific fields are subject to the console export options. It is recommended to confirm whether the required fields are checked before submitting the task.

Q: What will happen if I submit the same number repeatedly?

Answer: The platform provides a data deduplication warehouse to identify duplicate numbers across tasks and avoid repeated deductions. However, it is recommended to use other tools to do a basic deduplication before importing, and then cooperate with the platform to deduplicate the warehouse for double insurance.

Question: How long will it take for the results of base material screening to come out?

A: The detection time depends on the number of tasks, platform load and network conditions. Typically hundreds of thousands of numbers can be processed in minutes. After the task is completed, the platform can send notifications through the Telegram bot, and you can also log in to the console to view the results.

---

Screening of base materials is the link with the highest input-output ratio in foreign trade customer acquisition - filtering out invalid numbers at a small cost, in exchange for a higher conversion rate and lower risk of account suspension. Use this checklist to optimize your customer acquisition process now.

👉Log in to the console to start screening numbers Two-way contact customer service: t.me/kkdata_robot For more usage guides, please refer to Official Documentation Official website: kkdata.cc