Narrative 13: Import - Data mapping

Narrative 13: Import - Data mapping

Behind the scenes of a successful ticketing system: BTS Series

Narrative 13: Importing your data


When importing data into an application, it is crucial to prevent data loss or duplication. These types of errors can hinder the development of a clean and well-organized database, which is essential for effective data management and security.

Zoho Desk provides robust functionality for importing your data. The system intelligently automates the mapping of modules and fields to reduce the risk of data loss and maintain data integrity. Users have the advantage of verifying the field mappings in advance, thus adding an extra layer of security to the import process.

This capability is essential not only for clarity but also in mitigating the challenges associated with user adoption. For instance, clients can be accurately mapped to the "Contact name" field, while company names align with the "Account name" field to maintain an organized database, which helps ensure user trust in the system. 

Related knowledge base article: Importing data into Zoho Desk

Quote

Prerequisites

  1. Users can upload a .csv file or a .zip file containing multiple .csv files. 
  2. The .zip file must be named, for example, Contacts.zip, Accounts.zip, etc.

What are Identifier Fields?  

Identifier fields are fields used to find and match existing records when importing data into the product. They also help link related records, like connecting a contact’s name with their email address.

Each module supports different unique identifier fields for identification, as described in the table below:.  

Modules

Unique Identifier Fields

Accounts
​

Account ID

Account External ID

Account Name

Contacts

Contact ID

Contact External ID

Last Name

First Name

Email

Phone Number

Mobile

Tickets

Ticket ID

Ticket External ID

Ticket Number

Products

Product ID

Product External ID

Product Name

Tasks

TaskId

Task External ID

Calls

Call ID

Call External ID

Events

Event ID

Event External ID

Article Translation

Translation: External ID

Translation ID

Custom Modules

​

Record External ID

Custom Module Name

Quote

Points to remember: 

  1.  These fields help find matching records. 
  2.  If multiple records match the value, the first matching record will be selected automatically. 
  3. This can lead to unexpected matches or data being updated in the wrong record if you're not careful. 

Background:

  • Some users expressed a preference for matching Contacts by Last Name instead of Email, highlighting the importance of flexibility in their workflow. 
  • Other users approached matching through the use of a custom field, emphasizing the need for tailored solutions to fit their unique requirements. 
  • We also heard from many users who requested that the functionality be enhanced by updating existing records with the relevant entity's Zoho Desk ID to streamline their processes and improve data accuracy.

Working with the Identifier Field

When importing data into Zoho Desk, the Identifier Field is important because it helps identify existing records and avoid duplicate entries. 

Commonly used identifier fields

  • Find By is used to identify an existing record during the import process.
  • Map By is utilized to link a child record to a parent record, for instance, by linking a Contact to a Ticket.
You can now select specific fields for matching, providing enhanced control and customization during bulk processes or integrations. This functionality enables more precise data handling, ensuring that the information aligns with your specific requirements. By tailoring the matching criteria, you can streamline processes, enhance efficiency, and provide better outcomes for your team. This flexibility enables you to harness the full potential of your data.

Improvements in user experience 

Transparent process and status tracking 

We’ve implemented a straightforward, step-by-step process for data imports, complete with real-time status updates for each stage. This transparency enables users to monitor import progress and understand the current state of the process.

Unique identifiers for entity mapping 

New fields have been introduced to help users identify if a parent entity already exists when importing related child entities. For example, users can seamlessly map a contact to an existing account in Zoho Desk to streamline the import process while minimizing the risk of duplicate entries.

Enhanced error handling and log accessibility

We’ve made significant improvements in error handling by allowing users to download detailed error logs right from the history page in case of import failures. This enhancement provides users with greater insight into any issues and facilitates faster troubleshooting and resolution.

Support for custom modules

The import UI has been revamped to support custom modules, providing users with greater flexibility and customization options. This enables a more personalized and efficient data import experience.

Coming up soon

Custom unique fields

Identifying key data points, such as a Customer ID in the Contact Module, ensures that every customer has a distinct reference, which streamlines ticket management and resolution. By establishing these fields as identifiers, support agents can quickly access and update customer records, enhancing response times and accuracy.

External ID fields 

Integration with various systems often generates External ID fields, such as CRM ID, Invoice ID, and Bug ID. Utilizingthese fields as identifiers enables agents to cross-reference relevant records seamlessly. When records need to be updated or retrieved from different systems, these unique identifiers are crucial in maintaining data consistency across platforms.

Composite identifier fields

Often, relying solely on a single identifier may not be sufficient to pinpoint a customer accurately or a record.Implementing multiple fields as composite identifiers can enhance data integrity and accuracy. For example, considering both the Last Name and Email of a contact can significantly reduce errors in data retrieval and ensure that support inquiries are directed and resolved correctly.

Wrapping up

Using these features positions support teams to operate more effectively and improve overall customer interactions. For instance, a large corporation merging client data from multiple legacy systems into Zoho Desk modules will benefit significantly from automatic field mapping to ensure that contact and account names are accurately aligned. This attention to detail not only improves the user experience but also enhances overall data integrity during the merging process.


Please stay tuned for more in the Desk behind-the-scenes series.

 

Regards,

 

Kavya Rao

The Zoho Desk Team


    • Recent Topics

    • Archiving Contacts

      How do I archive a list of contacts, or individual contacts?

    • Filtering in Help Center

      Hi, our ticket system is based on a set of structured status categories. The customer must be able to filter by these status. How can we add "Status" as filter to the help center. In the same moment we do not need filters e.g. as "channel". How can we

    • On Edit Validation Blueprint

      Hello, I have a notes field and a signature field. When the Approve button is clicked, the Signature field will appear and must be filled in. When the Reject button is clicked, the Notes field will appear and must be filled in. Question: Blueprint will

    • Google Fonts Integration in Pagesense Popup Editor

      Hello Zoho Pagesense Team, We hope you're doing well. We’d like to submit a feature request to enhance Zoho Pagesense’s popup editor with Google Fonts support. Current Limitation: Currently, Pagesense offers a limited set of default fonts. Google Fonts

    • Increase Round Robin Scheduler Frequency in Zoho Desk

      Dear Zoho Desk Team, We hope this message finds you well. We would like to request an enhancement to the Round Robin Scheduler in Zoho Desk to better address ticket assignment efficiency. Current Behavior At present, the Round Robin Scheduler operates

    • Feature Request – Conditional Visitor Information Request in Zoho SalesIQ

      We would like to request the ability to conditionally ask for visitor details based on the communication channel used in Zoho SalesIQ. Specifically: When a visitor initiates a conversation through the live chat widget on the website, we want to continue

    • Can multiple agents be assigned to one ticket on purpose?

      Is it possible to assign one ticket to two or more agents at a time? I would like the option to have multiple people working on one ticket so that the same ticket is viewable for those agents on their list of pending tickets. Is something like this currently

    • Where is the settings option in zoho writer?

      hi, my zoho writer on windows has menu fonts too large. where do i find the settings to change this option? my screen resolution is correct and other apps/softwares in windows have no issues. regards

    • When Does WorkDrive integrate with Books?

      When Does WorkDrive integrate with Books?

    • CRM gets location smart with the all new Map View: visualize records, locate records within any radius, and more

      Hello all, We've introduced a new way to work with location data in Zoho CRM: the Map View. Instead of scrolling through endless lists, your records now appear as pins on a map. Built on top of the all-new address field and powered by Mappls (MapMyIndia),

    • Can we add zoho sign to a custom module?

      i understand out of the box it works with 8 modules. is it possible to add it to a custom module?

    • Synching changes to Stripe when changes are made in Zoho Billing

      We have a situation where we have merged customers in Zoho BIlling and then found out later that the payment in Stripe was not updated and still associated with the old customer record. The card gets updated and billed, but that payment is still associated

    • Zoho Sign Not Delivering

      I have sent several contracts out via Zoho Sign.   They do not seem to be getting delivered.  I had one person receive it, but the others have not.   I had one person tell me they sent it back to me and never got it and doesn't show as signed.  I've sent

    • Update latitude & longitude address field API

      How do I update the coordinates of an address field from a widget? I can't modify the latitude and longitude of the address field. I think the problem is how I'm writing formdata variable. zoho_init.then(function (data) { var queryParams = ZOHO.CREATOR.UTIL.getQueryParams();

    • Bank Feeds Breaking Constantly

      Hey Everyone, I have already reached out to support about this issue but I am wondering if anyone else is having the same issue. My bank feeds keep breaking within days of me fixing them by updating the credentials. Its been happening for a while and

    • Automatic Matching from Bank Statements / Feeds

      Is it possible to have transactions from a feed or bank statement automatically match when certain criteria are met? My use case, which is pretty broadly applicable, is e-commerce transactions for merchant services accounts (clearing accounts). In these

    • Zoho Payroll's USA and KSA editions are available in Zoho One!

      Greetings! We’re excited to share that Zoho Payroll, currently available only in India and the UAE, is now introducing the KSA (Kingdom of Saudi Arabia) edition and the USA (United States of America) edition, and these editions are now available in Zoho

    • Outlook/Hotmail Blocking Zoho SMTP IPs (S3150)

      We are currently facing a serious deliverability issue with Zoho SMTP while sending transactional OTP emails for our production application. Emails sent to Outlook / Hotmail addresses are being rejected with the following error: 550 - 5.7.1 Unfortunately,

    • Tip #63- Exploring Technician Console: Elevate to Admin Mode (Windows & Mac)- 'Insider Insights'

      Hello Zoho Assist Community! Ever been in a remote support session where you couldn’t complete a task because you didn’t have admin privileges? Maybe installing software, accessing secure system areas, or rebooting into Safe Mode just didn’t work because

    • Prevent accidental duplicate entry of Customer Ordersome

      Zoho Support has confirmed that Zoho currently does not have any method (using Deluge, flow or any other method) to alert a user when a sales order has been entered twice using the same customer reference number (i.e. a duplicate). Most ERP platforms

    • Zoho Mail - Email Reminder template (default)

      Zoho Mail Users, Does anybody here use the email reminder template? I'm asking Zoho to allow and add us to select which one of our many templates will be our default. It allows us to operate more efficiently. It's a Checkbox. If you feel this can benefit

    • Windows Desktop App - request to add minimization/startup options

      Support Team, Can you submit the following request to your development team? Here is what would be optimal in my opinion from UX perspective: 1) In the "Application Menu", add a menu item to Exit the app, as well as an alt-key shortcut for these menus

    • Zoho CRM Quotes – Subform and PDF/Writer Limitations

      Hello, I am encountering the following limitations in Zoho CRM Quotes: Custom product images cannot be uploaded in the subform – the image upload field cannot be added; only the file upload field is available. File upload placeholders cannot be used in

    • Canva Integration

      Hello! As many marketing departments are streamlining their teams, many have begun utilizing Canva for all design mockups and approvals prior to its integration into Marketing automation software. While Zoho Social has this integration already accomplished,

    • Announcement integration between Zoho People and Zoho Connect

      As we're using these 2 products, there're areas of overlapping especially in the Announcement. When there's a new announcement in Zoho People, can it push to the company wall in Zoho Connect?

    • Does Zoho Mail Have Popout windows?

      I recently switched my work email over to Zoho and everything I read said that you can popout the draft email as you're writing, however, all the pictures or info I've seen show the typical popout arrow in the top right, which I can not for the life of

    • Can I reorder how the staff are displayed on the booking page?

      As the title suggests, can I change this? Either reorder manually reoreded to my preference, or automatically (a-z, z-a etc.)

    • FSM integration with Books

      Hi, I have spent a few months working with FSM and have come across a critical gap in the functionality, which I find almost shocking....either that, or I am an idiot. The lack of bi-directional sync between Books and FSM on Sales Orders/ Work Orders

    • Bulk upload image option in Zoho Commerce

      I dont know if I am not looking into it properly but is there no option to bulk upload images along with the products? Like after you upload the products, I will have to upload images one by one again? Can someone help me out here? And what should I enter

    • Enhancement to ICR’s field prompting: Preferred data extraction using advanced field prompting

      Dear Customers, We hope you’re well A quick background Intelligent Character Recognition (ICR) comes as part of Zia’s optical recognition capability called Zia Vision. When we introduced it last April, the data extraction was training-based and was applicable

    • Filter Records in CRM API

      Hi Team, I’m currently working on a task to retrieve expired deals from the CRM. By “expired deals,” I mean deals where the closing date has already passed and the stage is not “Closed Won” or “Closed Lost” (i.e., all other stages). I tried using both

    • Subheaders for Sections in forms

      Currently, every form section has a field name, which one can choose to show/hide to the end user. It would be great if there was an option to show a SUB-HEADER in addition to a header. It would be useful for explaining to the end user what the section

    • Custom view inconsistencies

      Why is "is not" missing from criteria, along with other comparison operators ??? It makes it almost impossible to build required custom views, I don't want "void" invoices listed & why on earth would "Void" invoices be showing when the criteria includes

    • CRM x WorkDrive: We're rolling out the WorkDrive-powered file storage experience for existing users

      Release plan: Gradual rollout to customers without file storage add-ons, in this order: 1. Standalone CRM 2. CRM Plus and Zoho One DCs: All | Editions: All Available now for: - Standalone CRM accounts in Free and Standard editions without file storage

    • Promote a layout to standard so I can delete one layout

      Similar to this and many other topics: https://help.zoho.com/portal/en/community/topic/set-layout-as-standard The problem, every model has a standard layout, which is what we use most of the time... But as the business grows and evolves we may have to

    • Adding VENDOR SKU to PURCHASE ORDERS

      how can we add the Vendor SKU when issuing a Purchase Order , so the PO shows the Supplier SKU and our own Internal SKU , which is what we want to receive into the system .

    • Can Zia summarize fields?

      A great use case of AI for me would be summarizing company descriptions. We often get long winded descriptions from databases or scraping websites, then reduce them to a couple of sentences stating what a company actually does. Is there any way within

    • Zoho Recruit Community Meet-up - India (Venues Finalised)

      Zoho Recruit Community Meet-up - India (Venues Finalised) Namaste, India. 🙏🏼 The Zoho Recruit team is hitting the road—and we're absolutely excited behind the scenes. Join us for the Zoho Recruit India Meet-up 2026, a morning designed to make your recruiting

    • [Webinar] Solving business challenges: Secure, real-time, and external collaboration

      Hi Zoho Writer users, We are excited to announce Zoho Writer's webinar for March 2026: Solving business challenges: Secure, real-time, and external collaboration. Zoho Writer supports real-time collaboration by allowing teams to work together in documents.

    • Table dimensions

      I try changing the dimensions of the table on my computer but it doesn't change. Do I have to be a premium member or does it only work on the app?

    • Next Page