How to import contacts from CSV file

Posted in Import & export

You can export contacts from just about any desktop or web application into a CSV file (comma-separated values), and import it to Relenta by following these steps:

  1. Click on ‘Contacts’ tab in upper left
  2. Click on ‘Import’ contacts tab
  3. Click ‘Import file’ and browse for CSV file on your computer
  4. Click ‘Upload’

After the CSV file is uploaded, it will be processed in the background. When completed, you will be able to view the stats on imported and updated contacts.

CSV file format
Your CSV file must contain a header row, or first line, that defines the fields in your table. Relenta recognizes headers from the CSV files exported by most common applications such as Outlook, Act!, Goldmine, Gmail, Yahoo, etc.

You also have an option to create and/or edit your own CSV files, using headers from the list below.

Standard headers

  • First, FirstName, First Name
  • Last, LastName, Last Name
  • Full Name, Name
  • Title, Job Title
  • Company, Company Name
  • Comments, Comment, Note
  • Email, E-mail, Email Address, Mail, Mail Address
  • Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook

Smart headers

The following fields will be imported along with a label, that is if the column header is “Phone Mobile” and the value is 555-1212, then the number will be imported as field type Phone with value “555-1212″ and label “Mobile.”

  • URL, Site, Web site, Website, Web page
  • Phone, Tel, Mobile, Cell
  • Fax
  • Text
  • Messenger, ICQ, AIM, Yahoo, MSN, GTalk, Google Talk, IRC, Skype
  • Street, Address, Location, Address Line, City, Region, Province, State, Post Code, Postal, Zip, Country

If your address-related headers have a common prefix, such as HomeStreet, HomeAddress, etc. the prefix, in this example “Home,” will be used as a label.

Groups, tags and custom fields

  • Group, Groups, Group Name
  • Tag, Tags, Contact Tags
  • Custom:custom field name

Group and tag names should be separated by ; (semicolon).

Groups and custom fields must already exist in the system before you import contacts. Tags, if not already present, will be created on the fly during import.

Required fields

Any two of the following three fields must be present for a contact to be imported (or updated) by Relenta: First Name, Last Name, Email.

NB! If your imported file contains Relenta’s contact ID, the above rule doesn’t apply.

NB! If your file contains the Full Name column, then — depending on its format — it will be split into first and last names either as First Last or Last, First.

Updating existing contacts

Relenta uses a smart algorithm in an attempt to make a match between each contacts that is being imported and an existing contact in your Relenta database. This way if you accidentally upload the same file, the contacts aren’t duplicated. The algorithm takes into the account First Name, Last Name and Email and assigns points to each matching field. The contact with highest score is considered to be a match and is updated with imported data.

NB! The above algorithm doesn’t apply to the duplicate records present in the CSV file itself.