Importing 101

All right. Good afternoon, everybody and welcome to our webinar. This is importing 101 The third webinar in our foundation series. If you joined us yesterday for data entry 101. We talked about data entry best practices on the main gift and pledge screen. Read More

All right. Good afternoon, everybody and welcome to our webinar. This is importing 101 The third webinar in our foundation series. If you joined us yesterday for data entry 101. We talked about data entry best practices on the main gift and pledge screen. Everything that we discussed in the last webinar that was all about manual data entry. Now manually entering data like that is a okay, if you have a small handful of entries to do but what if you have dozens or even hundreds to do that would take so long to do manually. Fortunately, a DonorPerfect importing module will speed that process up significantly, while still adhering to data entry best practices. To start off, Hello again, my name is Shawn Patel arrow, we can see me here on the right hand side as well as my amazing, beautiful assistant, my puppy Athena, who will not be joining us today as long as there are no knocks on the front door. But I am thankful for all of you for joining us today. Today. In our overview of importing, I’m going to show you the entire process for importing from start to finish. This will also involve proper Excel file preparation. So make sure that you have Microsoft Excel on your computer. Now there are very similar software’s that look a lot like Microsoft Excel, like Google Sheets or Apple numbers. These are very similar software’s that look and have the same options as Microsoft Excel. But when it comes to importing into DonorPerfect, Microsoft exists, Excel is our one and only, and specifically the dot CSV, comma delimited file formats. That’s the one that we’re going to be working with. Also, I’m going to be pointing out some useful tips for successful importing along the way. Please note though, as we’re looking into the DonorPerfect system, that the contents of the webinar may contain features and fields that are different from your own. As all screens within DonorPerfect are customizable, what we may be seeing in this demonstration may be slightly different from what you are seeing on your end. So how can encoding help you here’s an example of a scenario where this tool will come in handy handy. Let’s say that you just had a successful event where you collected the names and contact information of people who are interested in learning more about your organization. The records are in a spreadsheet, but how can they be added to DonorPerfect online? Well, the import process allows you to transfer large amounts of data in to your DonorPerfect online system all at once, so you do not need to update a series of individual records manually. Alright, a properly formatted Excel file can add bulk data to DEP all at once. Let’s look at the big picture. This data may be coming from other systems such as FileMaker, access QuickBooks razor’s edge, a gift maker, Salesforce, et cetera. These systems have the ability to export that data you need into an Excel file. Then data taken from other systems is then cleaned up in Excel, before being imported into DonorPerfect. The spreadsheets you’re imported, could be coming from a variety of sources for a variety of purposes, such as mailing lists, a list of names and addresses from an event, gifts from an event, or even maybe a membership list that was managed by a different department that you need to get into DonorPerfect. And if you ever need to enter data, and mass in bulk importing is significantly faster than data entry and is less prone to data entry errors. Now all steps of an import are equally important. It’s kind of like putting a car engine back together. There’s only one way to do it and each step builds off of the previous step. You’re going to start off with data file cleanup, you’ll need to stick to specific formatting when doing that. Fortunately, we do offer multiple import templates that you can use as an example for how those files should be set up. And this is the first time I’m saying it, but it won’t be the last time that I’m saying it always Remember to create a backup of DonorPerfect. Listen, we’re all human, everybody makes mistakes. So I strongly advise creating a backup before you import anything. As long as you have a backup of DonorPerfect created beforehand, you will always be able to restore it in case you aren’t happy with the results of the import. Then, and only then after you’ve created your backup, you’re going to import the data now, just in case, you’ve gone through the process of formatting the file. If anything is off, the import process does offer multiple safety guards to help deter mistakes and errors along the way. But just in case, we always advise that after your import is complete, that you go back in and verify your results. I always like to say trust the system, but verify your results just in case of any unforeseen issues. After the imports done, take that Excel file that you used, grab a few random rows and spot check those entries in DonorPerfect just to make sure that the end result of the import is what you intended. And an example of an unintended consequence of the import process could be that duplicate records were created. If this does happen, you may have to merge duplicate records, if any were added. But we’ll talk a little bit more about that later once we get into the demo portion. Now, some setup and guidelines for that Excel data. First, you’re going to export that data from your other programs. And again, this is going to need to be saved in Excel as either a dot CSV, a comma separated value, or a dot txt file type. To be honest, we always mostly see dot CSV dot txt is very, very rarely used. But that is an option. And again, you can also consider using one of the import templates that can be found within the DonorPerfect community. We also recommend using DonorPerfect field names in the header row in Excel. And also ensure that each field has its own column. So let’s dive into DonorPerfect. Let’s take a look at a blank record and start preparing a sample file that we could use now for something like this. What I like to do is just take a look at a blank record within DonorPerfect. Here’s a blank brand new record. And again, if you missed the webinar on data entry 101, it’s important to know that first name, last name and the optional line are also used for the organization prefix, the organization name and the contact. They these three fields are what in the same. Their view is just changed depending on whether or not the organization question mark checkbox is checked or not. So in this example, I would like to do first name, last name. Let’s also do optional line, let’s include that as well as the organization checkbox and the donor type. So I have a blank Excel file pulled up here. And this is our column header row, the column header is going to be the first row in your Excel document. So for first name, we’re going to have to use the field name for first name.

Now this is the prompts that we’re seeing. This is the human language that you and I understand. But in order to find out what the field name is for first name, we’re actually going to have to go into screen designer to go to screen designer going to have you go to settings, which is the little gear icon at the top right. And what I’m going to do is I’m going to pop open screen designer by right clicking it and open it in a new tab over here to the right, so I can do a little bit of multitasking. A screen designer will be covered in depth in a later webinar. But the main thing that I want you to take takeaway is that when we’re looking at a donor record, that all of those fields, what we’re seeing is the prompts. So here we can see that first name, the field name that our Excel file needs for the import is very similar, but it’s formatted differently. In this case, the field name is first underscore name. And last name, very similar last underscore name. So let’s add that to our Excel file in the column header. So we’ll add first underscore name. We have a column for that, and then we’ll do last underscore name. And then I want to add, I want to add optional line here as well, is it optional underscore line, that’s kind of my assumption here, based off of the convention for these two, but I’m going to double check, just in case, let’s go back into screen designer. Let’s find optional line. Here we go. There’s a bit of a difference here, the prompt optional line is actually opt underscore line. This is the field name for optional line. That’s what’s going to be in my column header here, opt underscore line. are right, and then I want the organization checkbox, as well as the donor type. Let’s double check those as well. Let’s go back into screen designer here. The organization checkbox, which is always asking is this record an organization that field name is org underscore Rec. And let’s see donor type is donor underscore type. So I can add both of those as column headers to my import file here. Or underscore Rec. And donor underscore type are right now each row that we have underneath these column headers is going to represent a different entry. Let’s add myself to the system. My first name is Shawn, my last name is Taro optional line maybe doesn’t necessarily apply here. But I would also like to add in organization, the one I like to use, as an example is a lawn care company in my town called the sod father, which I love that name the sod Father, for a lawn care company, I always get a kick out of that. And since the optional line is going to be the contact, I can enter in my contact for this organization.

Here we go, can you copy and paste the field values from the DEP screen directly in to our Excel file? Let’s see is it going to let me know. So directly from this screen and screen designer, if I wanted to add title, it’s actually not going to let me copy directly from here, what I would have to do is edit it, and then copy the field name. Because and again, screen designer will be covered in a later in a later webinar, you can actually click and drag these fields to rearrange them. I wouldn’t advise against doing that unless you read our article or talk to support about doing that. But you’ll have to edit these fields with the little blue pencil if you wanted to copy the field name directly from screen designer, because all these fields can be clicked and dragged. I’d avoid that for now just so you don’t. So you don’t reorganize anything that you don’t intend to doing. We’re also getting get into a question. Do the field names need to be in all caps? Well, in DonorPerfect, the field name has to be in all capital letters. You will right now we’re looking at the main screen and we’ll see that all of these field names are in all capital letters. Most of these are system fields that come with your system. But when it comes to imports, know your column header does not need to be in all caps. As long as it has the characters and the underscore in the proper order. Then you’ll be good to go. So for your import file, it doesn’t necessarily need to be in all capital letters, but it can be rather picky about the formatting. So you know, this is correct first underscore name, Oh, you’re welcome fe, this is a first underscore name. Now, if I were to pop in a space before first underscore name, if I were to try to import this, the system would say hold on a second. Hold on, I know that there’s a first underscore name field, but there isn’t such a field with a space in front of it. So that’s something to be aware of as well. You know, we’re looking at this, it looks right. I can’t necessarily maybe notice right away, that there’s a space there, but it would recognize it. Either way, though. Our column headers need to be spelled and need to be using those underscores exactly like we’re seeing in the field name, but don’t need to be in all capital letters. Now. What about org rec, the checkbox that’s asking whether or not this is an organization. So these other fields, these are just checkbox, these are text boxes, you enter words in them, and that’s what goes in the fields. But what about a checkbox? How would that work? Would you enter in the word yes or no? Or would you enter in checked or not checked? Not necessarily. Remember that the organization field is asking the question, is this an organization? If the answer is yes, then the code that you would enter is a capital Y. If the answer is no, then the code that you would enter is a capital N. And it’s also best practice to have a donor Type value to support that checkbox, whether it is checked or unchecked. But we’re going to talk about donor type here on the next slide in just a little bit, a few other points of order here. If you’re ever importing monetary values for let’s say amounts for gift amounts, no comma, or dollar sign is needed. We just need numbers, perhaps a decimal point if we’re getting into sent values, otherwise, DonorPerfect will add that formatting for you. It’s also important to be consistent with your date format. We have DonorPerfect users all over the world. But if you’re in the States, you’re going to be using a month, day year format. But other places in different parts of the world use a different format for your dates either way, make sure that you’re being consistent with those dates. Another thing to point out is that codes must exist prior to being imported. And what do I mean by code. So let’s take a look at a coded fields. Now. A drop down menu is one such coded field. In this example, what we’re looking at is, we see the field name for general ledger GL underscore code. And we’re importing the code of UN that has the description of unrestricted a code of AF is for the annual funds. Here we have a column header for the solicitation, that’s importing the code AE one five for annual appeal 15. So again, we can’t use the description, we must be using the code. Now for the code that does have to be in all capital letters. Let’s go back to our example import file here. We can look at donor type, as an example here. Before we do let’s take care of our checkbox here. This first donor here, this isn’t going to be an organization so that can be unchecked. But for the sod, Father, local landscaping company that is an organization we do want that checked. Now what about donor type? So this first one, this is going to be an individual that’s not a foundation or a church. This is one single person and maybe for this landscape company, they would have a donor type of company. So what I entered here incorrectly, was the description, the value that we’re seeing within DonorPerfect if we go back to our blank record here, what we’re Seeing on this donor Type dropdown is the descriptions, company education, individual organization. But what we need is the computer language for these values, which is hiding on the back end. There, there’s a couple different ways that you can see what those codes are. But directly from the entry screen, if you click on the plus symbol, and then go to Manage codes, here, we can see all the different options that we have. So if I wanted to import a donor type of individual, the code that I would need is I n. So for my example file, I can remove individual, and I’ll put in the code for i n. Company, very similar company, this is the description. Let’s circle back, let’s take a look at our codes. And the donor type of company actually has the code of CEO. So that’s what I’m going to be putting and to my example, import template here. Now I do have some other samples that I’m going to use and the actual imports. But if we have time, we might do this quick and simple one later on at the end. Going back to codes, though, there are a couple of different ways that we can do that. One of them is where all of the codes live. Let’s see. What Yep, so we have two different options, we have either code maintenance. Let’s see, Kennedy and Jenny, I see your questions there. I’ll get to them a little bit. Later on that will be addressed. But as far as codes go, there’s two different ways to add them, either with encode maintenance, that is one way where we have the data entry screen with those plus symbols there that are on the right hand side. So we already saw that one option within DonorPerfect. This is a drop down menu, we can click on that plus symbol to add that value. Or we can go to settings and code maintenance. And once you’re in here, from the show only dropdown menu, you can select the fields that you want to see codes for. In this case, let’s take a look at donor type and click on go. And we’ll see all of our donor type fields. We can also take a look at flags. This is a another coded field. Let’s find our flag fields.

So now what about flags This is flags are a little bit different. These are multi select fields where one single flag field can have multiple values within it, would you just put those codes in a column header with flag? Well, not exactly it works a little bit different compared to everything else. A multiselect coded field is going to need to have the format of the field name in this case flag at symbol at symbol and then the code for the flag. So in this example, we have two column headers. For flag at symbol at symbol BD. BD is the code for board member. We have another column header for flag at symbol at symbol VL. VL is the code for our volunteer flag. So in this example, Once imported, James Morgan is going to get the board member flag as well as friend Fred fine stone here. And Kevin road Lee is going to get the volunteer flag. And underneath these column headers, you’re going to put in a capital X to mark each record that is to get those flags Now again, if you’re importing flags, those codes must exist before you do your import. So in the example that we had earlier, let’s say that I wanted to mark these To records as prospects, we would need to have the column header be flag at symbol at symbol, and then whatever my code is for prospects, which I can’t remember off the top of my head. Let’s go back into code maintenance, we’re looking at the codes for flags. And here we go. prospect has the code of p r o. So in my file in the column header, we’re going to have PRL That’s the code for prospect and putting an x here and an X there, just an x is going to result in both of these records getting the prospect flag added to them once the import is complete. Alright, we’re going to actually import these at some point. But first again, let’s go over some quick helpful tips. Before importing first and foremost, create a backup a backup backup is a snapshot of your database at that point in time. So if you don’t like the end result of your import, you can always circle back and undo everything that was done in the import. Also, blank fields in a data file will not override data that is in DonorPerfect. As one of the import options that you’ll have is to update existing donor records. Just know that if you’re ever doing that, that this process can never blank out of fields. Now, matching field criteria cannot be empty. The record matching step will double check your system to see if that donor already exists. So if you want a DonorPerfect to double check the first name, the last name, the address and the zip fields to see if that person is already in your system, then you will need to have all of those fields in your import template. Now, especially if it’s your first time importing. In addition to having that backup, I would also advise that you just import a small handful of records, then spa check the results to make sure that you like the outcome. If you like it, then you can proceed with the rest. If you don’t, you can restore your backup undoing the import and make any changes to your import template before trying again. Also, as a side note, because Excel can have multiple worksheets within it, just know that if your Excel file has more than one worksheet on it, you will have to split that file up or condense it into one single Excel file that has one worksheet on it.

Alright, and once your file is set up, you checked your field names, you checked your you checked your codes, and you added all of that to your Excel file. This is all essentially going to be done in three steps. I’m going to go over these three steps entirely, then we’re going to hop into DonorPerfect. And we’re going to actually do that import. First, you’re going to upload your Excel file that you carefully prepared, you’re going to tell the DonorPerfect import module, how you want that data to be handled, then you’re going to proceed. The next step, the system will verify that all of your column headers match with existing fields. If it finds any discrepancies, you’ll have the opportunity to fix it right here. And it’s also going to make sure that the import files codes are in the system already. And then lastly, you’re going to finalize the process and import your data. So on this first step here, you are going to click on a choose your file. This is going to pull up your file explorer where you can select your dot CSV Excel file, and you’re going to select it from there. After that you’re going to select how DonorPerfect is going to handle that import file. It’s going to be one of three options. The most common is the very first option that you’re seeing here which is try to update existing records and insert the rest is new. So if a record from the file you’re importing already exists within DonorPerfect, then that existing record will be updated. Now, if a record from that file doesn’t exist within DonorPerfect, it will be created as a brand new file. And now you will have the opportunity to turn on record matching, just to make sure that all of that is being looked at. And at the very end, you will be able to find out whether a inserted or updated a record. The second option that you have there would be to insert new transactions for existing records. In that scenario, all records will be imported as new transactions for existing donors where donor ID is required. And then the last import option that we have here is to update existing records. In this case, you must match records must match those transactions in the database with the ID from that transactional file. So donor ID for the main and bio tables, gift underscore ID if you’re updating any gift or pledge transactions, contact underscore id for any contact transactions, so on and so forth. But in the examples we’re going to be working with today, we’re just going to be taking a look at that first option there to update existing records and insert the rest is new, in which case, you’re going to have to select the type of record that is being imported. The options may vary, it would either be a main records only, it would be main records and gift transactions, main records and sled transactions or main records and contact or main records, and other info. Underneath that you have your matching criteria. Enable record matching criteria is one of the most important steps in the process. Because this determines how the system will know which records to put information in. If it is checked off, then you must select the record matching criteria by clicking Change criteria, which will open this screen that we see here. This allows you to determine what fields you want the system to find matches on. So let’s say in your Excel file that you’re importing. If you have John Smith, who lives at 123, Sonny lane, and the zip code 38201. And that person already exists in DonorPerfect, it will successfully update that donor record. And again, the fields that you’re selecting here for your record matching criteria must also exist in your spreadsheet. So if you have last name, first name, address, and zip is your record record matching criteria. your Excel file not only has to have all these fields in it, but will have to have values for all of them. Lastly, there are some additional options that are down here. If you were to click on show more options all the way at the very bottom there. There are some additional options here my file is encoded using and you can select different coding now. Why do you even need to bother specifying the encoding type? Well, not all languages use the same set of letters or characters. So different encoding types are used to make sure that they can meet the needs of various languages. However, if your import file is in English, leave windows and C the US default option selected probably won’t even need to change that. And again talking about consistency with dates, data in my file are formatted as here we have the US standard of month date year. If you are in a different part of the world using a different format. Make sure that you are changing that and everything is consistent there. Lastly, what about Alternate ID matching? Well, instead of using donor ID, we’re record matching criteria to match imported records to those in your system. You could set up a new field and DonorPerfect. As long as that field has a field name ending in underscore ID to act as a substitute. You can enable alternate It ID matching, so the records will use that field instead. The show more options rarely seen though. So once you have all of that selected, you have your file attached, you told it how you want it to handle the data and what is included in it, you turn on your record matching to check for existing records, you can click on next step, which will take you to the next page of the import process in step two and matches fields, and it previews the results, here, it’s going to determine where data from the import file will go in DonorPerfect. And right off the bat in this example, it caught a couple mistakes. So there was a column header here for what was probably meant to be first underscore name. But instead of using the field name, it was just entered first. And there’s a couple of drop down menus that you can use here to select the first underscore name that you wanted instead, similar issue with suffix. I know a lot of people don’t use suffixes. But in this case, the field name for suffix is just suffix. But when this one was entered, it had way too many accidents. And again, you’ll have the opportunity to select the field that you intended to use for that column. But this last column here, you can check to exclude those entirely, if so need bait. Once you have all of this handled, you can click on next step. And then at this step, it’s going to validate the data that is underneath those column headers within the file. What we’re looking for here is to have zero invalid records. And to have all of your pending records here. If there are any issues with your file, there’s going to be a number here next to the invalid Records tab. And you’ll have the opportunity to fix those mistakes. And again, here, the system is going to tell you how it’s going to handle those records. In the case of this example, based off of the record matching. In this example, these records did not exist based off of the record matching criteria. And it’s going to be inserting for those donors. And then final step import records. If everything went smoothly, you corrected all your mistakes, you’re going to see this beautiful, wonderful message telling you that your records have been successfully imported.

Also, from this screen, you’re going to have the opportunity to click on export to CSV. Next to all records or updated records. Essentially, what this is going to do is it’s going to duplicate your Excel file with a couple additional columns like the ones that we’re seeing here. That’ll tell you how that information was handled. Once you navigate away from this screen, you won’t be able to pull out this informative record. But we’ll take a look at that a little bit later on once we get into it in just a few moments here. And also it is a best practice. Once you have reached this screen and your records have been successfully imported. This is going to be your opportunity to double check, pull out a few of the rows that were in your import file and look them up in DonorPerfect. Just make sure that the records as they were imported look the way that you intended for them to look. So now let’s take a look at the actual process itself. Let’s go back into DonorPerfect. And from the home screen. If we go to utilities, the Import option is here. But I don’t even want to go there yet. We have to create our backup. So let’s go to backup and restore. And once you’re here, click on Create new backup, you are going to get a little warning message telling you that if you have three existing backups, like I do hear that it’s going to overwrite the oldest backup in that case, you know, it’s okay. I’ll tell it Yes. And now we have a backup for today at 346. So if the import that I’m about to do if I don’t like it, I can always click on Restore and it will undo everything back to 346 and it’ll undo everything so I can start over. Now a little note about this I would reach out to your colleagues, anybody else that’s working in DonorPerfect while you’re doing the import, just let them know that you’re going to be doing an import. Just let them know that you’re going to be doing an import. So in case you have to undo it, that any of their work won’t be lost as well. It’s also being asked, Where should we house the backup file. This actually is the backup file. Once you click on Create new backup, it’s not downloading a physical file. It’s saving that backup on our servers. When you click on Create new backup. And then once you click OK, it’s going to create that backup on DonorPerfect servers. Now, you should always be doing this before you do an import. But do know that DonorPerfect every night creates a backup of your system going back 30 days however, if you need to restore one of the backups that we created for you, that may incur a fee. So it’s best practice to always create your own backup before going to utilities and import. Hear take note of this little speech bubble tips. Two key steps to improve import success. Set up your import file using one of our many import templates. If you click on this little blue hyperlink here, it will take you to our online knowledge base that has examples of how these import files should be formatted. So down here in blue, we have hyperlinks to different Excel files, these import templates that are already formatted the way you need them. And the great thing about these is that in addition to having all the column headers and all the data in this fake example, formatted correctly, near the bottom, it’s also going to give you notes, additional notes on the proper formatting and the procedures here. Are right so first, we’re going to choose our file here, I’m going to select here’s one that we have with names and addresses. When importing this file, I’m going to tell it to update existing records and insert the rest as new. And let’s see my import file includes main records only. And let’s take a look at this import file. This was names and addresses. So everything that we have here, or gret, donor type, we have last name, address state. And we have some flags here over on the right. All of these are on the main and bio screens really the main screen, so we can tell the system that we’re going to be working with main records only. And now record matching is already turned on. But let’s double check we’re looking for last name, first name, address, and zip, all of which are in my Excel file. So as long as I didn’t mess anything up with that file, once I click on Next step, we should be led right to the second step of the import process. Bam, right away, we get an error, it doesn’t like what I did. What’s the problem here, error upload error, the file type is not compatible with the import module. Only comma or tab delimited files type, CSV or TXT are permitted. That was something that I failed to do. This is in a XLS format, what I need to do is go to File and Save As let’s put in my important file and what I need to select here as the type instead of Excel workbook. We’re looking for CSV comma delimited. This is the one and only this is the format that we need. Alright, so now when I go back into it, let’s choose it again. Here’s our Comma Separated Values that dot CSV. I’m going to select it again. We’re going to tell it oops. Let’s select it again. Import includes main records only. Then we can go to next step and this time, now that it’s in a dot CSV, it’s going to allow me to continue at this step that we have right here. 17 fields have successfully been matched. So what it’s looking at are the 17 column headers that I have here in this file, and it’s matching them to either existing fields, or in the case of flags, it’s matching them to flag codes, and it says, you’re good, you can continue, you formatted this correctly. Next, it’s going to look at all of the values that I have underneath the column headers to see if there’s any issues there. Let’s see drum roll doesn’t like it. And it’s good. Here we go. We have four pending records, each row each of these records is going to be imported. If I scroll over to the right, I can see that it matched them to existing records, and it’s going to be updating them, whether it be flagged salutation, et cetera, everything that wasn’t in our matching criteria is going to be updated. Since it was able to find matches, beautiful, invalid record zero, that’s what we want to see. And then final step import record. And give it a few moments. If you’re working with a very large file, you may need to have a little bit of patience, let the computer think, let it do its thing. But we only had four here in this example. So it’s good. And again, here, if I wanted to have a copy of my Excel file that has information on how it handled those records. Right from that screen, I can export out to find out whether it inserted or updated an existing one. And then, right from here, I can import more records.

And clicking on that will take us back to the very first step. And again, I can do more by click on choose file. This time, let’s do let’s do names and gifts. So this one I had prepared are ready, it is a dot CSV. But let’s pull this up. I’m going to pull this open. Let’s see, let’s pull up names and gifts. And let me expand this a little bit. And I’m going to zoom in a little bit to adjust so everybody can see this better. Let’s zoom in to 200%. Okay, so take a few moments here. And and take a look. Does anybody see anything that’s wrong with this file? If so, pop that error into the questions box.

Let’s see row number eight. For foundation. That’s correct. That’s good. There we go. Let’s see somebody else noted that the organization checkbox is Yep, this is a checkbox if either wire and N, we’re also seeing an issue with the optional line that should be opt under underscore line. Donor type foundation. That’s our description, we should be using a code instead. These are these are all correct. First, is supposed to be first underscore name. Exactly right. Everybody. All of this is correct. It should be your right. It should be first underscore name. That’s correct. Let’s see, Hannah, we have we had a couple of questions about Constant Contact. I’m gonna address that in the question section near the end here. Oops, sorry about that. Let’s pull open our file again. So you’re right. Everything that everybody has mentioned so far, is correct. There are several issues going on with this file. Now ideally, as we were creating this, what we would have done was we would fix this, we would fix it right away. But what I’d like to do is I want to leave this as is and I want to show you how DonorPerfect can find these errors and you can correct them as you go along which it hurts to see a little bit. It hurts to see in proper formatting. But don’t worry, DonorPerfect is going to be able to catch all of that for us. So we have our file selected. We’re going to be updating existing records and then inserting the rest is new. My import file and cool cludes not just main records, but main records and gift transactions, we’re going to leave our record matching criteria turned on. And then when we go to our next step, here we go our very first step. First, it’s supposed to be first underscore name. So here I can select the table where it is, we have two options for main, either the system fields, or a user field that somebody else created. In this case, I know it’s a system name. And then from this drop down, I can find first underscore name, optional line, that’s also on the main screen, and we’re looking for OPT underscore line. Here it is, that’s the one. And here’s another one, I didn’t scroll over far enough to the right to identify this. But there’s one for gift amount, which was accidentally written as check amount. So we’re going to select that as well. And we’re going to do a mount. And now I told it the correct fields, and it likes it, we can continue. Hmm, there it is, the dreaded invalid Records tab. Let’s see what it doesn’t like. Here we go, just like you pointed out earlier, if we click on Edit invalid records, we’ll have the opportunity to fix some of this. So org underscore wreck that’s going to need a capital Y foundation. I know that’s an F n. But let’s see there was a couple others that had found issues with the GL Code of unrestricted, and the solicitation code that doesn’t like those either. So if I scroll over to the right, I can also adjust my gift codes here. Unrestricted as the description, it’s actually the code of just UN. And you know what this is an old solicitation code from 2017. I don’t even want to use that one. And then we can revalidate give it a few moments. And now we have zero invalid records. And our final step import records. Let it think it’s doing its thing. There we go, your records have been successfully imported. So all these examples, we’re just doing a small handful at a time, most likely, whatever file that you’re going to be working with is going to be a bit larger. And either way, it’s going to save you a lot of time. So just to recap before I get into those unanswered questions. Last time, I’ll say this, I promise I won’t email you reminding you to create a backup before you begin. We also offer import templates on our online community that you can use it as a as an example for how your file should be imported. Each field type needs to be set up correctly in the import file, make sure that you’re using the field name and make sure that you are formatting those flags correctly. And there are three types of import either updating existing records, inserting the rest is new, inserting new transactions, or updating existing transactions. And last but not least, validate the success of the import by searching through everything that you imported, and make sure that everything’s okay, before you call it quits and carry on. All right, and that wraps up everything that we had to cover today. Uh, we did have a couple questions that I didn’t get to that I’m going to address now. By all means, everybody, thank you for joining me, you can feel free to head out now. But I am going to address some of these questions that I didn’t get to earlier. Let’s see. Here we go. So Deborah, if you’re still here, you will have to ask does this translate to your lists to use with constant contacts to? I’m not entirely sure what you meant by that. Do you mean that if you’re importing a list that you got from Constant Contact, if you could, Deborah, if you’re still here. Can you just elaborate on the scenario that you were curious about? Constant Contact if you’re not aware, that is a third party that we integrate with that sends out emails and mass and they do it very well? Constant Contact? So if you could just elaborate on what that question was Deborah, you’re still here. Awesome. Ah, importing a list from constant contact to DonorPerfect. Yes, constant contacts. Now, in that situation, Deborah, what I would do is I would reach out to support because I don’t have access to your system. What I would like for somebody in our support department to do is just to see how DonorPerfect is currently connected to Constant Contact. All of our new clients come with Constant Contact, but by all means, if you don’t have it already, you know, you certainly can, if there’s no connection between DonorPerfect and constant contact at all, you can speak to them. And you can pull out an Excel file and then you can import it in to DonorPerfect. Okay, yes, you are a new client. So yeah, Deborah, let me so everybody, you may have phone support. I’m not sure. But let me hop back into DonorPerfect. Not sure if you’ve ever contacted chat support, but when you’re in DonorPerfect, go to the little help bubble, the little question mark, and then go to chat support, reach out, talk to somebody there, you have a connection, just wondering if I needed to use the templates, you have? Yeah, you can certainly refer to those. I’m not sure what state that those Excel files are going to be in if you get them from constant contact. So I would reach out to our support department for assistance with that process. Now, as far as getting that Excel file from Constant Contact, you have to reach out to them. We do partner very closely with them. But there are some options that we just can’t do. Let’s see, we have another question. Sorry, I missed the first half. Is it possible to import? Is it we have another question here? Is it possible? Let’s see. Is it possible to import updates to the Contacts tab? Yes, it is. So let’s take a look. Let’s pull open a record here. Let’s look at Ms. Betsy Ross, we have the contact screen that’s here. Now what we’re going to need for such an import to update, what we’re going to need is the contact ID. So in this example, let’s let’s update a couple different values on the contacts that we’re seeing here on this donors record.

What we’re going to need is the contact ID, the contact screen is a transactional screen, each row representing a contact transaction. And to update one of those contact transactions, we’re going to need the contact ID. So I’m modifying right now I’m modifying the column so that I can see the contact ID. Now, let’s say let’s say we want to update the activity. For these take note, we have an activity of telephone call and an activity of mailing. So let’s create a brand new Excel file. And have it be a blank workbook. Let me zoom in. So you can see this a little bit better 200%. So we have to tell DonorPerfect, which contact transactions we’re going to be updated. In this case, it’s going to be the contact ID. And we’re going to do one, zero to five zero.

And what was the other one we’re going to do 9759. These are the unique contact ideas for both of these transactions. So now we’ve told it, we want to update these two contact transactions. Now in this example, what I’m going to be updating is the activity code. Now again, you could be updating multiple values all at once. We can even insert into the comment field or something else but let’s see activity. Let’s double check screen designer make sure that we have the correct field name. Contact underscore ID that’s correct. I was wrong. My hubris got to me I thought activity was the right field name, but it’s actually activity underscore code. Let’s fix that. need the right column headers, activity underscore code. And let’s say I want both of these to have a different activity code. If I go to Code maintenance. Let’s take a look at our activity codes. And maybe I want to give them EO email out a new value.

Right? So I already have let’s make sure we get our backup create a new backup say okay.

Is it possible to link records during the import? Or do you have to do that manually afterwards? So just so you know, that is not possible. You can never import links on fortunately to connect them, that is always going to have to be a manual process.

See, where did I save that file? File, Save As? Oh, got to make sure it’s the right file format CSV.

All right, in this case, we’re going to be updating existing records in a specific table, table specific ID is required. In this case, that would be the contact ID. Record matching is not going to be turned on. Because we have contact underscore ID in there, it’s always going to match with one 100% accuracy. Again, first step, verifying our field names in the column headers. Next step, it’s going to validate the code that I’m updating in there, in this case, email out EO. It likes both of them, we have zero, invalid records final step in Port. imports have been successful. So now when I go back to Betsy, his record, this page was loaded before I did the import. So we’re still seeing those old activity codes. But when I update it, we now have our new activity code. Array. Excellent. Excellent. You, Hannah. You’re very welcome. Deborah. Amanda, you’re very welcome. Happy to help. Yeah. So feel free to reach out to support. They’re open till 8pm. eastern standard time if you have any additional questions. Otherwise, thanks, everybody, for hanging out. Thanks for coming in today. appreciate everybody being here. Let’s see. Oh, let one last question. The example you just did. Can the Edit be done? manually? Yes, yes, it could. So thank you. Thank you everybody for coming by. This has been importing 101 I have been Jamba Taro. All of you have been wonderful. Thank you for stopping by. Have a great day.