Importing Accounts and Contacts

[Aldrin]

Hi,
I am using Outlook 2007 with BCM 2007 and trying to import Accounts and
Contacts from an excel file(s). The issue I am having is that the Accounts
import just fine, as do the Contacts, however the contacts are not linked to
the "Parent Company Name" in this case the account, even though the "Parent
Account Name" is in the spreadsheet. All the other columns import fine just
not the linked account, so the contact does not "belong" to a company. I even
creted a contact in BCM and linked it to a company, then exported that
contact (it had the parent company) , then deleted the contact in BCM and
re-imported the same file that BCM exported, BUT again the link between the
contact and the company was ignored.

Hope someone has a solution!

 

[Burcu Kinay [MSFT]]

Hi Aldrin,
I see two import paths in your post.
1) You import your contacts from Excel. BCM currently does not import
linking from Excel files. (linking is kept only in .bcm formatted files).
BCM does not create linking using Parent Account Name.

2) You create a contact and export it.
- Do you use .bcm format?
- Do you export only the contact you created?

 

[SalesGuy]

I have the same needs as Aldrin. I need to import contacts from excel and
have them link to the accounts. It seems odd to me that a program like this
would not have a way to link imported contacts to their respective accounts
except through MS's own proprietary format (.bcm). Burcu, are there any work
arounds for this? Is this in queue to be fixed at MS?

 

[virtualison]

I think I have a similar issue. I imported account info into bcm from excel
but tried to map a contact person's name to the "primary contact" field in
bcm account.
This did not work. I'm thinking the primary contact within bcm can only be
selected individually, and that I'd need to import my contacts separately,
not to accounts but to contacts.

It just doesn't seem possible that there's no way around this issue. Anybody
know of one?

I had planned to do a marketing campaign to 700 people--some primary
contacts with accounts, i.e. customers that we have, some business contacts
(leads). It would be very inefficient to have to manually select primary
contacts.

Suggestions? I am just setting us up on bcm and am looking for resource
material as to how best to set our database up in bcm.