Our current import tool will allow both CSV and XLSX files, however, because CSV files tend to be less complex, they are still the recommended file type for import.
What is a CSV and how do I import it?
A CSV is a comma-separated values file which allows data to be saved in a table structured format. CSVs look like normal spreadsheet but with a .csv extension. Traditionally they take the form of a text file containing information separated by commas, hence the name.
CSV files can be used with any spreadsheet program, such as Microsoft Excel, Open Office Calc, or Google Spreadsheets. They differ from other spreadsheet file types in that you can only have a single sheet in a file, they cannot save cell, column, or row styling, and cannot save formulas.
Your file will need certain formatting in order to be imported into PhoneBurner correctly.
1. To change the format of an Excel spreadsheet to CSV you will need to use the save as option and save as CSV (Comma Delimited)
2. Once you have the data in a CSV, you will want to check the file to make sure it is clean and that the information will go into PhoneBurner easily. Cleaning up data before uploading can save a lot of time and hassle of locating/deleting and re-uploading if there are errors.
Here is an example of a CSV with some bad data that should be cleaned up before import.
Item #1 Shows the header row. This is important because it makes it easier to import the data into the system . The image below shows what happens when you have no header rows. #2 is the data you are importing from that column.
and when you do have headers or data labels in your first row as shown below, it is easier to map the data:
It is easy to recognize some of the data and if your file is very basic with just names and number and email address and this is ok, but if you are new to imports, and have lots of data, you will want to make sure you have headers.
If you have just numbers in a column with no headers, and you don’t know what the number represents by column header, you could make mistakes on the import.
#3 in the sample file shows the data in the city column.
**NOTE: Some of these contacts show the city, state and zip all in that column. If you import the data this way, it will load In the system but if you needed to later search for a contact by zip code, you would not be able to do the search because there is no zip field in the csv and it is part of the city. You should divide this into separate columns whenever possible.**
Example of Properly imported data:
For information on how to split a cell in Excel using text to column : https://support.office.com/en-us/article/Split-a-cell-f1804d0c-e180-4ed0-a2ae-973a0b7c6a23
Here is what the data looks like after the split done twice for state and zip.
Bad vs Good data:
In this example the phone on the left would not be able to be dialed as phoneburner does not dial extensions automatically.
And for the Owner name (#5) as well. This could have been imported as one NAME, however First Name and Last Name is better as it allows easier import and searches. If both names are together, they would need to be imported into the first name column.
Now you are ready to do the import with the cleaned up file.
1. Go to the Contacts tab and click the button labeled 'Import'.
2. Choose your file:(you can either drag and drop or browse to the file)
3. Select a folder to put them in or create a new folder.
4. Choose how to handle duplicates. Do you want to import, not import or merge them into existing contacts.
**Note: Tags and Saves search is optional, however recommended as an easy way to find the imports later in case you make a mistake and need to remove them or want to move them.**
5. Choose how you want to handle DO NOT CALL numbers:
6. Create a saved search if you want to find them easily later.
7. Select a Lead Source or Create a new one.
After hitting next, you are ready to confirm if you data looks correct.
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