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Home > User Guide > Working with Contacts and L... > About Importing Contacts

# About Importing Contacts

Oracle CRM On Demand Marketing can import contacts from Excel and CSV (comma-separated value) files. You can either upload import files from a local drive or transfer the import files from an FTP server. Oracle CRM On Demand Marketing supports the XLS and XLSX Excel file formats. The contact information to be imported can be in any language, but multibyte data, such as Japanese or Chinese requires that the file be encoded in UTF-8 format.

You can use folders to organize contact import configurations. For example, you might want to organize imports by geographic region or by market segment, or consolidate all contact imports related to events in an events folder.

Configuring an import is a multistep process and Oracle CRM On Demand Marketing provides a wizard to guide you through the steps.

Oracle CRM On Demand Marketing applies global deduplication rules during contact imports and also lets you create custom deduplication rules for each specific import. This prevents the creation of duplicate records for contacts that already exist in the Oracle CRM On Demand Marketing database.

You can import registrations/attendance for multiple programs from a single import file.

Process of Importing Contacts

Before importing contacts, you must create an import file. The first row in the import file (the header row) contains a comma separated list of field names that are picked up for mapping. You can import contacts by using the following procedures with the Import Contacts wizard.

To import contacts, perform the following tasks:

1. Choosing Import Options

2. Selecting an Import File

3. Mapping Fields in a Contact Import

4. Defining Deduplication Rules

5. Defining Merging Rules

6. Scheduling Import Jobs

7. Configuring Import Details

8. Checking the Status of an Import Job

Choosing Import Options

This procedure describes how to choose import options.

To choose import options

1. Click the Contacts tab.

2. Click the folder where you want to store the import configuration.

3. Click the Import Contacts subfunction.

4. Click New Import.

5. (Optional) In the Import Options screen, you can select both of the registration and attendance options in the same import:

   - Upload Registration. This option marks the contact as registered for a specified program. If a previous registration already exists for the contact, then no action is taken. If no matching contact exists then a new contact is created and marked as registered. Operational reports are available to track the scoring and queue assignment for the imported registrations.

   - Upload Attendance. This option marks the contact as having attended a specified program. If a previous attendance already exists for the contact, no action is taken. If no matching contact exists, a new contact is created and marked as attended.

   Oracle CRM On Demand Marketing displays and validates the maximum number of records that can be imported in a file. The maximum number varies, depending on the import options you select. When importing only contacts (without the registration or attendance date), the maximum number is 20,000. For imports that include the registration or attendance date, the maximum number of contacts is 1000.

Selecting an Import File

This procedure describes how to select an import file.

To select an import file

1. Click Browse or provide the FTP details to upload the import file. For FTP and SFTP, the following information is required:

   Field | Description
   --- | ---
   FTP Server | The FTP server name, for example, ftp.acme.com.
   Username | The FTP user name.
   Password | The FTP password.
   Remote Directory | The directory on FTP server where the file is located.
   File Matching Pattern | For recurring FTP import jobs, you can specify the file matching pattern. Oracle CRM On Demand Marketing looks for files that use the pattern and imports them. The options are: Starts With Ends With Contains Exact

Caution: When downloading lists for a contact import from an FTP or SFTP server location, Oracle CRM On Demand Marketing renames the file on the FTP or SFTP server after the import has been processed. Therefore, use a file matching pattern other than Exact. If Oracle CRM On Demand Marketing looks for a file name that matches the import file for subsequent import jobs, the file is not found, and the import fails. Either change the file name for the next import to be run each time to match the file name specified in the import configuration, or use one of the partial file name matching options, such as Starts With, Ends With, or Contains.

1. (Optional) If you are importing registrations and attendance, you must specify the source for the program name and the registration or attendance dates or both. There are two options:

   - You can manually select the program name and registration date and attendance dates. Only a single program can be selected.

   - You can specify that the option program name and registration or attendance information is available in the columns of the import file.

   The Validation screen appears.

2. Compare the number of records in the import file to the maximum number of records you can import. Review any file parsing errors that might be reported on the Validation screen. If there are errors, decide whether to cancel the import and address the errors, or continue the process with the errors.

3. Do one of the following:

   - If you specified that the program name and registration or attendance information is available in the columns of the import file, you must select the column names in the file that correspond to the program name and registration or attendance dates.

     For the date columns, choose one of the following date formats:

     - MM/DD/YYYY

     - DD/MM/YYYY

     - YYYY-MM-DD

     For date/time columns, choose one of the following formats:

     - YYYY-MM-DDThh:mm:ss+hh:mm

     - YYYY-MM-DDThh:mm:ss-hh:mm

   - If you did not specify that the program name and registration or attendance information is available in the columns of the import file, click Next.

Mapping Fields in a Contact Import

This procedure describes how to map fields in a contact import.

To map fields in a contact import

- In the Field Mapping screen, do one of the following:

  - Select the Source Field Name and Source Format attributes from the lists.

  - Click Auto Prepopulate Mapping to map the attributes according to the source field name.

Column headers in the import file must match the attribute names for Auto-Prepopulate to map them. For example, if the attribute name is Company, and the source field name is Company Name, Oracle CRM On Demand Marketing cannot prepopulate. You must manually map the field name in the import file to the corresponding attribute.

The Transformation field section can be mapped manually, depending on the data integrity rules.

If you indicated that the program name and registration or attendance dates are columns in the import file, you cannot map these columns to any target profile or use them for custom deduplication rules.

In the Field Mapping screen, there are six data types available, as described in the following table:

Data Type | Description
--- | ---
String | You can map First Name as String, because it can contain alphanumeric characters. You can also decide to choose First Character Uppercase to ensure data consistency and usability for personalization. For State, if you use two-character state abbreviations, you can decide to select String and then All Uppercase.
Number | You can map Phone Number as number.
Email | Email Address can be mapped as email.
Date | Date of Birth can be mapped as date. NOTE: Source Format Selection is mandatory if the source data type is Date.
Boolean | The values are: True/False, 0/1, or Yes/No.
Date/Time | For example: MM/DD/YYYY HH24:MI:SS MM/DD/YYYY HH:MI:SS AM DD/MM/YYYY HH24:MI:SS DD/MM/YYYY HH:MI:SS AM

If an Answer Code Mapping screen appears during field mapping, the imported file might have some columns that are mapped to Oracle CRM On Demand Marketing attributes that have answer codes. You must manually map entries from the import file to the correct answer codes. For example, if the CSV file has a country value of India, and the Oracle CRM On Demand Marketing country attribute has an answer code for India as Ind, then enter the source value as it appears in the CSV file (India), and map it to the country answer code in the Target Value (Ind).

The Answer Code Mapping screen requires that you select a resolution option: Flag Error, Create Answer Code, and Assign Default. For data integrity, select Flag Error. The Import Job Status detects any nonmatching answers and provides an opportunity to correct and reimport those contacts.

Defining Deduplication Rules

There are two kinds of deduplication rules allowed in the Deduping Rules step of the contact import process.

- Global deduplication rules. These rules are defined at a high level and apply to every contact import.

- Custom deduplication rules. These conditions are defined in addition to the Global Deduping Rules and apply only to the current import. You can create a custom deduplication rule that is based on any attribute in the import file.

The following procedure describes how to define a custom deduplication rule.

To define a custom deduplication rule

1. Select the Define Custom Dedupe Rule option.

2. Select an attribute by clicking its check box.

3. (Optional) Select the matching type (Exact, Starts With, Contains, Fuzzy Match).

4. Click Add to complete the custom deduplication rule.

5. After you have configured all the rules, click Next.

Defining Merging Rules

Merging rules define how values in the import file are handled if a duplicate record is found in the contact database. The most commonly used option is Update if Blank. The determination must be made whether the Import File can contain more current information than the existing record. If the information in the Import File was provided by the contact, it is probably more current.

The following procedure describes how to define the merging rules for a contact import.

To define merging rules for a contact import

- In the Merging Rules screen, select the Source Field Name and the matching type.

  Select from the following options:

  Option | Description
  --- | ---
  Update if Blank | While updating the matched contact (using deduplication rules), Oracle CRM On Demand Marketing enters the attribute value from the import file only if it is currently blank.
  Do not Update | While updating the matched contact (using deduplication rules), Oracle CRM On Demand Marketing does not change the attribute value in the existing contact record.
  Overwrite | While updating the matched contact (using deduplication rules), Oracle CRM On Demand Marketing overwrites the attribute value in the existing contact record with the attribute value in the import file.
  Append | While updating the matched contact (using deduplication rules), Oracle CRM On Demand Marketing appends the attribute value from the import file to the attribute value in the existing contact record. When choosing Append, note the limitations of the character count for attribute values.

Scheduling Import Jobs

The following procedure describes how to schedule an import job.

To schedule an import job

- In the Scheduling screen, do one of the following:

  - Click the Calendar icon to select a date.

  - To schedule the import job to process immediately after it is saved, click Now.

  - For FTP-based import configurations, you can set the import to run once or automatically according to a schedule that you define.

Configuring Import Details

The following procedure describes how to configure import details.

To configure import details

1. In the Import Config Details screen, complete the following fields:

   - Configuration Name. Enter the name for the configuration.

   - On Success Email. If the import is successful, an email is sent to the specified email address.

   - On Error Email. If the import job fails, an email is sent to the specified email address.

2. In the Field Mapping section, review the details of the mapped fields, the merging rules, and the deduplication rules.

3. Click Save.

Checking the Status of an Import Job

The following procedure describes how to verify the status of an import job import.

To verify the status of the import job

1. From the Quick Access menu, choose Actions.

2. Click Check Job Status.

3. (Optional) When an import has finished successfully, return to the main Import Contacts list screen, and click Success.

   A status report for the import job appears.

   If there is a record count for a category in the report (for example, Number of Contacts Created), you can click View to see the corresponding contacts. This detail is available for 30 days after the day of the contact import. After 30 days, only summary metrics are available to verify the status of the import.