Birthday and Anniversary Report Overview
Why This Matters
The Birthday & Anniversary Report gives you a complete view of all upcoming special events so you can plan personal outreach, coordinate mailings, or work through your list manually. While the Birthday Assistant handles automation, this report provides the manual control and visibility you need when you want hands-on management of birthday and anniversary recognition.
Use this report when you need to see everyone with birthdays in a specific month, print mailing labels for card campaigns, add bulk notes after sending cards, or verify your birthday data is complete and accurate. The report complements automated birthday workflows by giving you a planning tool and manual backup option.
What the Birthday & Anniversary Report Shows
The Birthday & Anniversary Report displays all contacts who have special events recorded in your database for a selected month. Special events include primary contact birthdays, related contact birthdays, wedding anniversaries, account anniversaries, and any custom occasions you've tracked using the Special Events tab on Contact Records.
The report shows the occasion type, date, contact name, full address, and phone number in a table format. You can filter results by contact category to narrow the list to specific groups like clients, prospects, or VIP contacts. The report works independently from Birthday Assistant settings and shows all contacts with special events regardless of whether they're included in your Birthday Assistant automation.
Accessing the Report
Navigate to Reports in your main menu and select Birthday & Anniversary Report. The report opens with the current month selected by default. Choose a different month from the dropdown to view special events for any month of the year. Use the "Filter by Category" dropdown to narrow results to contacts in a specific category, or leave it set to "All Categories" to see everyone.
The report updates immediately when you change the month or category filter, showing all matching special events in a sortable table.
Working with the Report
The Birthday & Anniversary Report provides several tools for working with your list of contacts.
Print the List: Click the Print button in the upper right corner to generate a printable version of the current filtered results. This opens your computer's print dialog where you can print to paper or save as a PDF. The printed list includes all columns shown in the table: occasion, date, name, address, and phone number. Use this for reference lists or planning meetings.
Print Address Labels: Click the "Create Labels" button to generate mailing labels for everyone in the current filtered results. The system formats labels for Avery 5160/8160 label sheets. A label preview window opens showing the formatted labels with contact names and addresses. Choose which row and column to start printing at if you're using a partially used label sheet, then click the printer icon to print. This feature is ideal for birthday card mailings or anniversary card campaigns.
Add Bulk Notes: Click the "Create Note" button to add the same note to every contact in the current filtered results. The system adds a note that says "sent card" to all contact records shown in the report. Use this after mailing cards to document your outreach without opening individual contact records. The note appears in each contact's Notes tab with the current date and your name.
Add to Group Actions: Click the circle icon on the far right side of each row to toggle contacts into or out of Group Actions. When the icon is grey, the contact is not in Group Actions. Click it once and it adds the contact to Group Actions. Click it again and it removes them. Use this to selectively build a group of contacts for bulk processing like sending emails, applying tags, or performing other group actions without including everyone in the filtered results.
Understanding the Data Displayed
The report pulls data from two sources on Contact Records: the Birthday field on the Contact Card and the Special Events tab on the Contact Record.
Occasion Column: Shows the type of event and whose event it is. "Birthday : Primary Contact" means the main contact's birthday. "Birthday : [name]" indicates a related contact's birthday tracked in Special Events. "Anniversary : Primary Contact" shows wedding anniversaries. "Other : [description]" displays custom events you've labeled like account anniversaries or contract renewal dates.
Date Column: Shows the date formatted as month/day/year. If you entered only month and day without a year in the Special Events tab, the report displays the date without a year. The report lists all events chronologically regardless of occasion type.
Name for Address Label: Shows the name as it will appear on printed labels. This field comes from the "Name for Address Label" field in the Special Events tab on the Contact Record. If this field is empty, the report uses the contact's full name from their Contact Card.
Common Use Cases
Monthly Card Mailing Campaign: Filter the report to next month, print labels for everyone, write and mail cards, then click "Create Note" to document the outreach in one step.
Category-Specific Recognition: Filter by "VIP Clients" category to see only your top-tier contacts with birthdays this month. Add them to Group Actions and send a personalized email blast with a special offer.
Data Verification: Review the report monthly to identify contacts with missing birthday data or incorrect dates. Click through to contact records to update information and improve your database quality.
Planning Ahead: Print the next three months as PDFs at the beginning of each quarter so you have advance notice of upcoming special events for personal outreach planning.
Selective Automation Bypass: Use the report to identify contacts who should receive personal outreach instead of automated birthday emails. Add them to Group Actions, apply a "Personal Outreach" tag, and exclude them from Birthday Assistant automation.
Anniversary Campaigns: Filter to contacts with wedding anniversaries, add them to Group Actions, and trigger a workflow that sends anniversary wishes with a couples' discount or special offer.
Adding Special Events to Contact Records
The Birthday & Anniversary Report only shows events you've recorded in your database. Use the Birthday field on Contact Cards to enter the primary contact's birthday. For additional special events, open the Contact Record and navigate to the Special Events tab.
Click to add a new event and choose the occasion type: Birthday, Anniversary, or Other. Enter a description for custom events like "Account Anniversary" or "Contract Renewal." Select the month and day, and optionally add the year. Fill in the "Name for Address Label" field to control how the name appears on printed labels and in the report.
You can add multiple special events per contact. Each event appears as a separate row in the Birthday & Anniversary Report when its month matches your filter. The more complete your special events data, the more useful the report becomes for relationship management and outreach planning.
Relationship with Birthday Assistant
The Birthday & Anniversary Report and the Birthday Assistant work together but operate independently. The Birthday Assistant automates birthday recognition based on your configuration settings and processes only contacts who meet your "Who should be included" criteria. The Birthday & Anniversary Report shows all contacts with special events regardless of Birthday Assistant settings.
Use the report to preview which contacts the Birthday Assistant will process in upcoming months, verify that automation is working correctly by checking for system-generated notes on contact records, identify contacts you want to exclude from automation and handle manually, or maintain visibility into all special events even for contacts outside your Birthday Assistant criteria.
The report serves as both a planning tool and a manual backup. When automation handles most contacts, the report helps you manage exceptions and special cases that deserve personal attention.
Questions and Answers
Q: Can I export the Birthday & Anniversary Report data to a spreadsheet?
A: The report doesn't have a direct export function, but you can print the list to PDF and then convert it to a spreadsheet if needed.
Q: Why don't I see some of my contacts with birthdays in the report?
A: The report only shows contacts with data in the Birthday field or Special Events tab. If a contact's birthday isn't appearing, open their Contact Card and verify the birthday is entered. Check both the Birthday field and the Special Events tab.
Q: Can I print labels for only some contacts instead of everyone in the filtered results?
A: Yes. Use the circle icon on the right side to add only the contacts you want to Group Actions. Then use Group Actions to work with just those contacts. However, the "Create Labels" button prints labels for everyone in the filtered results, not just Group Actions members.
Q: Can I see special events for the entire year at once?
A: No. The report requires you to select a specific month. To see multiple months, print or review each month separately. You can also use Advanced Search to find all contacts with birthdays in a date range and work from that list.
Q: Can I customize what the bulk note says instead of "sent card"?
A: The "Create Note" button adds a standard "sent card" note. If you need different text, add contacts to Group Actions and use the Group Actions note feature where you can write custom text.
Q: How far in advance should I run the report for card mailings?
A: Plan for at least two weeks before the month begins. Print labels in mid-month for the following month to give yourself time to write cards and ensure delivery before birthdays occur.
Q: Do related contacts appear separately in the report?
A: Yes. If you've added a related contact's birthday in the Special Events tab, it appears as a separate row in the report with "Birthday : [name]" in the Occasion column. Each special event gets its own row regardless of whether multiple events belong to the same household.
Q: Can I filter by multiple categories at once?
A: No. The category filter shows one category at a time. To see contacts from multiple categories, either view each category separately or set the filter to "All Categories" and manually identify the contacts you need.
Guide Type: Feature Overview
Estimated Time: 5 minutes