Does anyone else receive email opt-ins at events and bulk import them into NXT?

Shol Stadlen

We're an orchestra which receives opt-in data at each concert and bulk uploads them after each event to add and welcome new users, as well as to tag the event they attended and the event location. The problem is that this process creates a large number of duplicate records each time, which takes a huge amount of time to de-dupe manually (automatic deduping would fail to detect which version of a user's record is the most important one).
Does anyone else have a similar process or a solution?

Austen Brown

@Shol Stadlen - Welcome to BB Community Forums! Are you using the native RE import tool or a third party tool like ImportOmatic/Importacular?

Alex Wong

@Shol Stadlen
Classic “you pay it now or later” issue.

There is no perfect deduping that doesn't involve a human, so “perfect” is relative to your need. So either you “do more” before/at import time, or you “do more” de-duping afterward.

I strongly discourage the “do more” de-duping afterward, cuz it will be forgotten and data will be mess up forever. The “do more” before/at import time can be depending on what information you collect at registration and what tool you use to import into RE.

Say for example, you collect email address. If you don't use any tool, and simply use RE database view constituent import, then you can always “export” all emails in RE and do some forumla in Excel to compare to the “RE list” with the “incoming list” to determine “existing vs new” before import. If you use a tool (i.e. ImportOmatic or Impactacular) then you can do this in the logic you build into the tool to find existing during import.

Shol Stadlen

@Austen Brown Hi, thank you for the welcome and the reply!
Yes, we are using the native RE importing function.

Shol Stadlen

@Alex Wong Thanks for the reply. The complication with de-duping before importing - apart from not wanting to work with our entire database in Excel - is that we want to import and tag both existing and new users with the event they have attended so we can send them targeted comms in the future. So to do this it seems like we have to create duplicates, but then, as you say, you have to spend a lot of human hours de-duping which is very difficult for our tiny team, with no dedicated data person.

Alex Wong

@Shol Stadlen
it's exactly b/c you need to do follow up later on that clean data is important in your database. So in the future you can easily query on those who came to multiple events.

If you use a tool, it will be easier, however, you can still do this using constituent query and import.

How big is your database (# of constituent records?)

once you identified existing vs new. You will use a constituent import to create the NEW. then query on the new's Constituent ID. the existing you identified will already have Constituent ID. then use another import (Paritcipant import) to import the event particiation for both existing and new

Christine Robertson

@Shol Stadlen I would definitely recommend that you look into Importomatic/Importacular. They will allow you to identify existing constituents without constituent IDs and you can then determine what data is added/updated on both new and existing constituents.

Shol Stadlen

@Christine Robertson Thanks for the reply! I checked out Importacular last year and it was way out of our budget range. Do you know how much Importomatic costs?

SmartTHING Developers

@Shol Stadlen @Christine Robertson If you are looking for a budget-friendly import tool with duplicate checking built-in, you could look at our SmartIMPORT too (just to add another into the hat)…

Shol Stadlen

@SmartTHING Developers Thanks for this. How much does it cost?

Christine Robertson

@Shol Stadlen I can't give pricing for Importomatic or Importacular since I don't work for either company, but I'm a bit surprised that Importacular was out of budget given that there is a free version of it that includes constituents, email addresses, solicit codes, attributes, consent and a few other areas.

SmartTHING Developers

@Shol Stadlen Sorry, I can't put pricing on here due to the community forum rules but you can see pricing on our website if you Google SmartIMPORT. We don't hide it…

Shol Stadlen

@Christine Robertson
Thanks very much for your help. I think the free version doesn't work for us as we need to import various custom attributes which aren't covered. On the website Importacular says:
"It is free to import Constituent, Address and Gift data using Importacular. For each of the other areas and to access support, a subscription fee applies."

Christine Robertson

@Shol Stadlen Constituent Attributes are included in the free version of Importacular. They are included as part of Constituent data along with Solicit codes, Constituent Codes, etc.

Shol Stadlen

@Christine Robertson Thank you, that's very useful to know, especially as I have a meeting with them on Thursday.