Darren Liu, Microsoft Dynamics CRM MVP
Crowe Chizek and Company LLC
October 3rd, 2007
http://www.crowecrm.com
For CRM Titan, the ability to import data has been improved significantly from the previous version to make it much more robust when importing data into CRM. The Import Data Wizard contains the following new features:
· Ability to import most record types, including custom types, not just the four types (accounts, contacts, leads and campaign responses) that may be imported before.
· Automatic mapping of imported records. (e.g. if you have a pick list contain Value A, B, C and D. It will automatically map the values for you, if it can't find the value, it will automatically add the value to your pick list field – I need to understand this further, as this could be an issue if any user can indirectly add picklist values)
· Ability to reuse data maps (if you have an import process that imports data in a file that contains the same file format (same columns), you don't have to recreate the mappings every time when you do the import. You can create the mapping once and re-use it next time when you import the file with the same data format)
· Email notification when import jobs are done; after the import, there's an option that you can set to have CRM notify you that the import jobs are done
· Duplicate detection tie-in; works with the dup check system in CRM, if a duplicate is detected, it will not import the record
· Improved error handling; if a import job failed, you will able to see why the job fails
Some Screen Shots:
The Data Migration Wizard adds even more ability:
· Relate records from multiple record types
· Create custom entities and attributes automatically during the data migration process.
· Migrate Notes and attached files (I have not tried this myself, still need to verify)
· Records can assign to multiple Microsoft CRM 4.0 users.
The CRM Data Migration tool is a separate install and it didn't install by the default CRM installation. Both Data Migration and Import tool will first go through creating/updating the metadata first, then import the data to CRM.
Some Screen Shots:
There's a lot more you can do with the data import and migration tool now, I am still digging into the tool to understand all that it can do :)
Darren Liu, is a Senior Consultant and CRM specialist at Crowe Chizek in Chicago. Darren is also a Microsoft CRM MVP and enjoys working with both existing and new clients to leverage the benefits that CRM can provide. Additionally, Darren is very active in the Chinese and English CRM online communities.
