Importing Users

The most common way to create Membrain Users are manually, User by User as your internal resources increases over time but occasionally you might need to add multiple new Users or update multiple Users' information at the same time from an Excel or Google spreadsheet and this article will offer a step by step guide through this process.

An overview

The first step is to download this User Import Template template, where you will find columns for all base fields available on a User level and highlight which are mandatory to include to be able to perform a User import.

If you base your import spreadsheet on the Import Template and you have made sure to fill in all the required information and, if applicable, any additional User Custom Field data that you wish to import, you can import this file into Membrain. Using the Import Template ensures all your data is aligned and imported into the correct fields within Membrain and your data integrity is maintained, but you can also create your own User import sheet as long as it includes the same type of data that is highlighted as mandatory (headers in green in the User Import Template).

Files must be in XLS format (Excel 97/2000/XP/2003) or XLSX format (Excel 2007).

Before you begin

All your Users are or will be Contacts in Membrain. If you have already added these Contacts in Membrain, but you want to make them Users, make sure you spell their Names and Email Addresses identically to the Contacts.

Download the Template

Click on this link to the User Import Template and click Download.
Save the file locally to begin editing. This creates the empty spreadsheet you will use to organize your data and make it ready for import.

Add your data

Export the data from your other systems to Excel.
Populate the template with this data, or manually add the contact information into the correct columns
Save the file as a XLS (Excel 97/2000/XP/2003) or XLSX (Excel 2007) file.

Import into Membrain

From System Setup - Data Management - User Import
Click on Upload a file to import and browse to the file you have just created
Import Options: Choose if you want the import to only Create New Users, only Update Existing Users, or both
Click Next
Map the fields by aligning them to their correct names. You will see errors and will be able to work through them in your spreadsheet until you are fully confident that your data is correct and ready to be imported
Click Import x rows, and you're done!

Considerations

If you are updating information for Existing Users, be sure to leave the spreadsheet cells for Password EMPTY for existing Users. Password should only be mapped and/or filled in for New Users

Membrain uses certain fields as unique identifiers during the import to avoid creating duplicate records. For Contacts, the fields below are checked for pre-populated data and if found, the record will be skipped/overwritten or you will be asked how to proceed (based on what you have decided at the beginning of the import).

External Identifier (if used)
Email (if used)
Name (under Company, First + Last)

Common Problems

Some situations, outlined below can cause problems when importing your data and should be checked before carrying out an import to ensure as clean as possible data is imported.

Lack of a Company Name
Multiple phone numbers in the same row (2 is the max amount of phone numbers per contact and needs to be in separate cells in Excel)
Name- either you have both first and last name in each respective column or if a few contacts lack a last name, then the best option would be to merge this into 1 column called "Name"
Wrong spreadsheet format. This may cause the system to read this as a deflected file and the import will not be possible (highlighted below). Files must be in XLS format (Excel 97/2000/XP/2003) or XLSX format (Excel 2007)
The sheet you want to import is not the first sheet in the file. Drag the import sheet to the far left, save your file and re-upload it to Membrain