Although it can be an issue virtually anywhere, many addresses in urban regions are multi-occupancy buildings with several people living at the same street number.

As Henrik Liliendahl Sorensen writes on his blog, Liliendahl on Data Quality, this can introduce new complications when a company is undertaking a list management project that focuses on contact data quality and data matching for a client or business.

He points to address verification and geocoding as two "important methods for achieving data quality improvement related to the top data quality pain" -- building a single-customer view. Although single addresses and geocoding are more commonly used, the problem of tracking unit numbers remains challenging, Liliendahl notes.

Geocoding may have applications for making addresses more specific and accurate, but as The Huffington Post notes, the technology could also be used by companies to run direct marketing campaigns on a local level. That capability will mean organizations need to pay even greater attention to having reliable records of their customers' locations as well as the locations of their stores.

"If brands wish for consumers to engage at the point of sale … their locations must be optimized for engagement in the same way websites are optimized for search," the Post says.