e-score

The e-score is a consumer rating metric used to to determine an individual's potential value as a customer and to use that information to guide marketing efforts. E-score algorithms factor in variables such as salary, occupation, home value, debt load and shopping history, and assign a numerical score. 

E-scores are often used to evaluate an appropriate level of marketing and the types of offerings that are likely to be successful with a given consumer. Perhaps even more importantly, e-scores can indicate which consumers are unlikely to be profitable, so marketing resources will not be wasted. However, the e-score has no bearing on an individual's credit rating and cannot be taken into account for financial dealings such as loan applications. 

A number of companies provide consumer e-scores to other businesses. eBureau, a St. Cloud, Minnesota-based company, provides a service that they call eScore. Here's how the eBureau service works: A customer, such as a credit card company, provides eBureau with a list of leads (names of potential customers) and a list of existing customers that were first identified as leads. EBureau associates the names with relevant details and the software adds additional data associated with those details. The data from potential customers are compared with data from existing customers to determine the e-scores for individuals on the list of leads. Based on those e-scores, the credit card company can decide what type of card to offer to each individual and determine which individuals are not good prospects.

E-score information is not made available to consumers.