I need to upload and use a list of contacts without changing existing contacts in HubSpot

[KKlamczynski]

A lot of people have multiple email addresses.  To be fully compliant with online privacy laws, I need to use the email address that was given for a particular newsletter.   Thus, I will upload a specific list when sending out that newsletter.  I do not want to override the contact information our sales team is already using in HubSpot.  I just want to send my newsletter to my contact list.

When I uploaded a list to HubSpot, I discovered HubSpot changed some email addresses in my list to something else that it had on file.   How do I get HubSpot to use the information I upload?  It would be acceptable if HubSpot added an alternate email to existing contacts, but it shouldn't overwrite existing information generally.

[karstenkoehler · Accepted solution]

Hi @KKlamczynski,

It sounds to me like there might be a misunderstanding about how HubSpot works exactly here. Currently there isn't any way to upload contacts and only have them update for one team (e.g. marketing). The information is always shared between teams and the choice is between updating them for all or not updating them at all.

The collaboration with the other departments and the cross-referencing will happen in any case. If sales are working on a contact that has the same email address as a row in your import file, both their activity and your email send will be reflected on the same contact record.

Generally, you probably want to import your list and not update existing values. This will keep the information gathered by the sales team and you will have a list of recipients after the import.

Let me know if you have follow-up questions to this!

[karstenkoehler · Accepted solution]

Hi @KKlamczynski,

It sounds to me like there might be a misunderstanding about how HubSpot works exactly here. Currently there isn't any way to upload contacts and only have them update for one team (e.g. marketing). The information is always shared between teams and the choice is between updating them for all or not updating them at all.

The collaboration with the other departments and the cross-referencing will happen in any case. If sales are working on a contact that has the same email address as a row in your import file, both their activity and your email send will be reflected on the same contact record.

Generally, you probably want to import your list and not update existing values. This will keep the information gathered by the sales team and you will have a list of recipients after the import.

Let me know if you have follow-up questions to this!

[KKlamczynski]

As I said back in July in the "solution" already marked, "not update existing values" is what revealed the problem in the first place and is not an acceptable solution that keeps us compliant with GDPR laws.  We've discussed the situation and determined that since I have the regularly-tested customer contacts, I overwrite.  Eventually we hope to consolidate data.

[KKlamczynski · Accepted solution]

I think I better understand this limitation.  (Side note: the suggestion to import my list and not update is what I did the first time, and that revealed the problem that started this thread.)

Within our company, we can easily share contact information.  That isn't the issue.  The problem is that I believe that we owe customers the right to ask us to use certain email address for certain uses.  If they chose to use one address for their customer login on our support website, but they sign up for marketing newsletters with another, that should not be a problem for us, and it is only becoming a problem now as we try to migrate to using HubSpot.  I don't think this is just a nitpick--it may be legally required (now per GDPR or in the future) for us to use the email address(es) customers provide for the purpose they specified, so I'm surprised that this is so difficult to do within HubSpot.

I appreciate your time, Karsten, to make the features more clear.  I'll work with my team to see what will work best for our organization and customers.

[karstenkoehler]

Hi @KKlamczynski,

Happy to assist. If you found my reply helpful, I'd appreciate if you could also mark it as an accepted solution for others to find it more easily.

Best regards!

[KKlamczynski]

Update: it doesn't seem there is a simple solution.  I will have to do more digging and am thankful for the hints above.  Worst-case, I can send out my next newsletter by uploading only email addresses, but that is not meeting our company goals of cross-referencing our marketing impacts on future sales.  Using the objectID seems like it would allow that cross-referencing, but I have to find a procedure that is fairly easy ("a few clicks" versus "combing the list by hand") because I upload a new list of 600-ish recipients every two months.

I am thankful for the replies above, both of which have given me things to look into.  

[karstenkoehler]

Hi @KKlamczynski,

Imports can be tricky to navigate. A lot of things are usually learned the hard way.

It sounds like you imported a list of contacts into your HubSpot portal. What you wanted to achieve was that new email addresses would be added as new contacts, however some email addresses of existing contacts were updated, is that correct?

HubSpot will only do that if the import file includes the so called Object ID of a contact. Otherwise, as @Crystal_Hopper has pointed out, the email address is the unique identifier. What does that mean? If HubSpot can find a contact with the same email address, it will update the contact with other information (columns) from your import file based on that email address. If it's a new email address, HubSpot will create a new contact.

If you however have the Object ID in your import file (after previously exporting contacts from your HubSpot portal – that's really the only way to get this information), you can tell HubSpot during the import of your list to update the contacts not based on their email address but based on their Object ID. HubSpot will then look at this ID and update other fields based on it – including the email address.

Without the Object ID in your import file, everything should've stayed the same. HubSpot can't have changed email addresses of existing contacts. Things might look confusing after your import but there would be another reason.

If the sole purpose of your import is to create a list of emails, I'd recommend omitting any other column from your import file during the import. You can choose to not import it or to not update existing values. This is to make sure that you're not overwriting information put in by sales before. In the last step of the import, select to create a list. As a result, you'll simply get a list of contacts, "un-updated". Let me know if you need assistance finding these options in the import wizard.

Unfortunately there isn't a reverse button for imports but a HubSpotter has shared a great tutorial on how to revert the effects of an import by working with historical values. Not super-easy, but doable.

Let me know if I got something about your request wrong. If you have additional context, I'm happy to help.

[KKlamczynski]

Hi Karsten, I think you may have given me a "workaround" to use my email list (without any associated names, etc.); however, this means that HubSpot won't cross-reference my outreach/service effort (from the Service department) and show our "impact" on future sales.  To me, that's part of the point of our company using HubSpot.  Without this cross-referencing, there's little reason for me to use HubSpot for our service newsletter...which really irks me since I put a lot of time into re-creating it within HubSpot when it was already on another platform.

So I think I would like to use the ObjectID of the contact; however, I can't fathom at the moment how to get my 600-or-so emails correlated with objectIDs from HubSpot.  My list of individuals is not the same as the Sales team existing contacts (I may have some they don't; they have many that I don't).  I will look further into how to use the ObjectID.

Thank you,
Karen

[Crystal_Hopper]

Hi @KKlamczynski! With emails being KEY, emails with the smallest difference should be treated as different and create new contact records (even if to you they are duplicates). That being said, perhaps this could explain it. And I think you should contact Support about this. 

Hubspot as a company knows A LOT of email addresses and names. Just think about all of Hubspot's clients (you, me, and everyone else). I've had situations where I put in an email address and it immediately gets marked as a "bounced" email account. Talking to Support about this, I found out that they as a company try to help us keep our contact records clean by learning about the email address and applying those learnings globally across all Hubspot users. So, if an email address bounces for a different Hubspot client, and then I put that email in my system, Hubspot tries to help me out by marking the account. 

Now, I don't always like that they do that, but I get it. Something similar could be happening to you. Email Address 1 is in your Hubspot for the Sales Team. You import Email Address 2 as a different contact for your mailing list. However, Hubspot knows that those 2 email addresses are related and they could be trying to help you clean up by merging them together. I can't say that I've seen an instance where an email address was overwritten; I have seen them get Merged into one contact record. An overwrite should only be possible if you are importing and using the Hubspot Contact ID. If you are updating to a Contact ID then an overwrite would occur.

Again, I'm not always in agreement with Hubspot on this action plan. These kinds of things typically get me on the phone with Support so we can straighten it out.

[KKlamczynski]

Hi Crystal, I did not see how to have HubSpot use my email as "Email2" during my list import.  It simply asked if it should overwrite existing information, and I said 'no' because I don't want to disrupt the sales team and their existing contact information if it happens to be different.  (Turns out I had the right email for one customer and they have a wrong one--but HubSpot kept the one that bounced a few times previously anyway because I said to not overwrite...but it overwrote MY list import.)

I am going to have to look further into how to use Email2.  Thank you for that hint.  --Karen