Stuff You Need To Know About Import

Import is our focus this month in Stuff You Need to Know. Import is a great way to make bulk changes in the database, whether adding gifts or constituents, updating addresses, or any number of other record changes. 

Check out our Need to Know section, where you can find the resources to help make you an Import master! Then swing by our Forum Contest to share your wisdom and see what your fellow Community members have to say. Then, if you still can't get enough RE Import, please join me for our Import Live Chats on the 10th and 24th of this month, where I'll be sharing tips and tricks, hosting a discussion, and answering questions. 

There's a lot of great import knowledge headed your way in the Community this month, but to get you started, here's a bonus tip: Import is normally used to add information to the database, but did you know that you can also remove some data?

By importing a caret (^) into most fields in the Raiser's Edge, you can actually make that field blank on the desired record. This is handy to correct data entry mistakes, prepare for a global change to records, or can be used in conjunction with the Delete Phones Plugin, which can delete any phone record that doesn't have a number. 

As an example, in the following demo, let's say that my organization has decided we'll no longer track Religion in our Raiser's Edge database, but I'm starting with a small group of dummy records as a test run. By importing a ^ into the Religion field, I can remove the data from each record within five minutes!

Check out a video demo here, and then take a look at Stuff You Need to Know for more great tips!