Profiles import and data update

How to import data

Customer profiles import and update can be organized depending on database size, new subscribers processing scenario (directly or from CRM), and company technical capabilities. There are 5 ways to import profiles into a database:

• Manual import — add one profile at a time using the edit form
• Clipboard — import profiles list from the clipboard
• From a file — import profiles from a file with customer data
• Via API — import profiles using API integration
• Schedule — import profiles from the external SQL database on schedule

tip

Altcraft Marketing also has integrations with external services:

• Tilda — integration with Tilda data collection forms.
• LPGenerator — integration with LPGenerator data collection forms.
• Yandex AppMetrica — integration with Yandex application metrics service.

Manual profile creation

To manually create a new profile, navigate to the database editing window or open the profile list. Then, at the top, click the button and select the import method as "Manual". You can also use the database context menu for this purpose.

The profile creation/editing form will open. During profile creation, you can add personal, contact, registration, and tracked data. This information is recorded in standard database fields. Values for additional (custom) fields are specified in the "Additional fields" tab. Mandatory fields are marked with a red asterisk. You can create additional fields and set them as mandatory on the database editing page. Below, on the "Subscriptions" tab, you can immediately assign a client to a specific resource when creating the profile.

caution

Email and Phones fields on the Profile tab are not used for communications. You can store contacts in these fields and use them in subscriptions. Youcan also leave these fields empty and store customer information in subscriptions.

By default, the Email field is used for profile identification along with profile_id. You cannot create a profile manually without this field.

In import options, you can disable triggers for the new profile and enable location by Reg IP (registration IP address)/IP (last known IP address):

Import profiles from clipboard

If you need to import several customer profiles after collecting data from several sources, you can use import from clipboard. Select an appropriate item in import menu or context menu at the top part of the database page.

You can enter any data in the form. When you press the Import button, this data will be converted to CSV table.

info

CSV (Comma-Separated Values) is a text format for tabular data.

Enter table header with field names in the first line. You can use any names for fields. Start each record with a new line, separating column values with commas, like in this example:

When you press the Import button, import.csv file will be created and import from the file form will be displayed (see next paragraph).

Import from file

You can use import from files to upload many profiles or update existing data. csv, txt, xls, xlsx, zip, tar.gz formats can be used.

info

When you upload data from a list or clipboard temporary file import.csv is created - and import from file form is opened.

Multiple table files can be uploaded into import from file form simultaneously. Press X next to file name to remove it. To add a new file, drag it to upload area or click on it and select file.

Profile search mode

Profile search mode defines what information from your file will be used in Altcraft for profiles search. This is necessary to update data without duplicating records. The following modes are available:

• By email, from profile or subscriptions - search by email from database or subscriptions.
• By email from profile - search by database profile email.
• By phone, from profile or subscriptions - search by phone in database field or SMS subscriptions.
• By push data from subscriptions - search by the identifier of push subscription (device token).
• By profile identifier - search by system identifier profile_id.
• By custom field - searchby custom database field, like customer ID in company CRM.

Subscription during import from file

During import from file, you can subscribe your customers to certain resources during import from file. In Subscription settings section, click Add subscription button. In Subscription source field, select column of your file which contains contact information for the specified communication channel.

Select Resource, Channel, and Subscription Status for each subscription. Also, it is necessary to select push provider for push subscription.

Column Matching

tip

Pass profile contact information to Altcraft resources subscriptions (see the previous paragraph). You can store this data in database fields in order to search profiles. If customer identification is configured using CRM or other identifiers, email and phones may not be stored in appropriate fields.

After subscriptions are configured, you need to match columns in Altcraft database and columns in your file. Altcraft will detect columns automatically if their names fit system ones:

• Database column — select customer profile field to store data. You can select standard and custom fields. If it is not necessary to add data, select the Skip option or delete the column by pressing X in the right part of the table.
• Source column — selectdata source from your file. The firstrecord will be displayed for each column for data type proper selection.

The "Ignore empty" option is used when updating profile data that is already in the database. For example, the profile field "vendor" already contains the value "test.com", but now you are importing a file where the "vendor" field for this client is empty. The platform will overwrite the field with an empty value. To avoid this, enable the "Ignore empty" option for the corresponding column. In this case, the value in the "vendor" field will remain the same.

If your file has unknown client data written with values such as null, nil, none or undefined, the platform can also proccess these values as empty. To do this, you need to enable both the "Treat null value as empty" and "Ignore empty values" fields. In this case, the platform will not update the field.

note

• null, nil, none and undefined are case insensitive.
• the values "0001-01-01 00:00:00 +0000 UTC" and "0001-01-01T00:00:00Z" can also be processed as empty.

If your table has a header with column names, select the number of rows occupied by the header by the Skip lines parameter.

You need to specify how you want to change the value in the profile field in the column «Action»:

Action	Field type	Description
Set from	all types: integer, float, line, date, boolean, enum, IP, tag, object, array of objects	Sets the value specified in the source column field.
Set custom	all types: integer, float, line, date, boolean, enum, IP, tag, object, array of objects	Sets the value entered in the field manually.
Remove field	all types: integer, float, line, date, boolean, enum, IP, tag, object, array of objects	Deletes the field from the profile.
Increase value by column value	integer, float	Increases the value by the number specified in the source field. You can decrease the value by using a negative number.
Increase value by field value	integer, float	Increases the value by the number entered in the field manually. You can decrease the value by using a negative number.
Add element	tags	Adds the tag specified in the source field.
Remove element	tags	Deletes the tag specified in the source field.
Add or edit element field	array of objects	Adds or updates the element specified in the source field. Specify the path to the property of the field you want to change.
Remove element field	array of objects	Deletes the element specified in the source. Specify the path to the field property.
Set value from field	object	Sets the value of the specified property to the value from the source field. Specify the path to the property of the field you want to change.

Import details

Select Import mode in the import details — it will depend on whether you add new records or update existing in the Altcraft profiles database:

• Add new leads and update existing ones
• Add new leads, do not update existing ones
• Update only

Additional options are included in the Import options section:

• Don't start triggers related to this action — disable on-import triggers and scenarios for this operation.
• Detect geolocation by Reg IP / IP — automatically record location to subscribers' profiles using WHOIS.
• Resubscribe customer profiles regardless of their current subscription status — change profiles global subscription status to Subscribed.
• Create a static segment from the results of this import — create a static segment during the import process.

Import via API

tip

API is used for integration with external systems — sites, applications, customer data management (CRM) services, data collection forms.

• Use API query to import or update a single profile.
• Other import API queries are described in the Profiles section.
• Managing profile subscriptions is described in the Subscriptions section.

Scheduled Import from External SQL Databases

tip

Altcraft can automatically collect data to import new customers profiles and update existing profiles from MySQL, MS SQL, PostgreSQL and Oracle RDBMS.

Instructions for configuring scheduled import are in a separate article.