Export then re-import to bulk edit?

[TrucksByGlen]

I am laboriously switching over from Zoho to Hubspot -- something told me I should have started here, but that's for a different conversation. While I have all kinds of ideas and wishlist items, right now I want to export all my contacts, make changes in a spreadsheet, then re-import them and HOPING they will merge duplicates. Will they? The problem I have is that all the contacts did not associate with their respective companies. Editting over 7,000 contacts to do this is incredible arduous. Is there an easier way? Will my export and import method automatically merge duplicates?

[Bryce]

I came here with the same question but for a different reason.

I just exported my (Hubspot Sales) contacts list, tidied it up and want to import it back again with just the changes being applied like you can do with a lot of programs.

Is this possible in Hubspot? I can see that I can import a list of new contacts but not if I can import a list of existing contacts that has been exported and tidied up.

[LeeHouse · Accepted solution]

HI Bryce.

Yep you can do this. However you must have the email address in the export as when you import this back in Hubspot uses the email address to make sure it doesnt dupe contacts.

This is the same with companies, but you need to make sure you have the domain in that list.

Hope this is what you meant?

Lee

[TrucksByGlen]

Yes that helps, thanks. Unfortunately the list Is still a bit raw and doesn’t have the email addresses associated with all accounts yet. Sigh: just have lots of labor ahead of me. Note for others: If I were not an individual, I would pay the $500 for another company to handle it. (Or if my details were more pertinent I would probably do it, too, but since the bulk of the data isn’t purified I am going to match as I go. But fret not because there is another option and HubSpot is a better CRM).

[Bryce]

Thanks, @LeeHouse, yes, that's what I meant. I will give it a go.

Strange that it doesn't use the contact ID which every contact has and is unique to every contact as the anchor field...

[LeeHouse]

@Bryce Thats the exact same question i asked Hubspot support the other day when I realised i'd duplicated all of my contacts by not exporting the domains from the company contacts. It tells you you need to do this on the import but not on the export, by that point its too late!

The unique number would have been a much simplier option. Oh well.

Good Luck.

Lee

[Bryce]

@LeeHouse @TrucksByGlen

I just removed a couple of contacts which didn't have email addresses and imported the contacts back in. It worked great with no errors. I was just tidying up the contacts phone numbers so that mobile numbers were in the right field and so that all of the phone numbers used the international dialling prefix (+64 for New Zealand) so that contacts can be called via Hupspot. Not something that's important unless you're a bit OCD like me 🙂 but also a bit of practice and learning.

Regarding the Contact ID, it specifically ignored this column! See the screenshot.

Also, I found that whole contacts import was configured around importing new contacts. It would be great to have a workflow for tidying up contacts or companies in bulk that didn't force you to allocate a Lifecycle Stage and declare that you have emailed these contacts in the last year and they agreed to be contacted etc etc - I just want to take existing contacts and do a bulk edit and put them back in thanks!

[TrucksByGlen]

That’s what I was thinking too: HubSpot assigns identifier numbers to Contacts and Corporations so why wouldn’t it use those for the CRM identifier values? Zoho allowed to export with those ID #s, update, and then upload the corrections; and it would properly assign the appropriate changes to the appropriate accounts/contacts. It is a good thing I didn’t take that for granted or everyone would already be duplicated. It’s odd that this superior system would not incorporate such a simple change.

[nuphunk]

That's what most CRM and websites rely on - a unique ID

[markkofman]

It has been some time since you posted this question, but if youbare still looking to fix contacts and companies association, check this article - http://docs.import2.com/working-with-hubspot-data/associating-contacts-with-companies-in-hubspot

Hope this helps

[TrucksByGlen]

@markkofman Thanks for the suggestion but I still question if values will align properly or not -- especially as a pay service (although at only $99 for one month I would have tried it early in the transition. Perhaps this post can help others that are just starting Hubspot to find it and try it).

My big question: If I named the fields properly (I believe) and the contacts weren't associated, what can a pay service do differently? It's "water under the bridge" now, but hopefully someone can give more insight and it can help future prople setting up.

[markkofman]

Don't want to go too much into details of our service here, but Wizard can handle data imports and updates of existing data with very flexible mappings. We also can use Contact ID for matching instead of the email address. It's just what Import2 is focused on, which allows covering more edge cases than any native import tool can.

Feel free to reach out to us at help@import2.com if you have any outstanding questions though.