CRM cleanup

A customer list you can trust again.

A customer list goes wrong slowly. A duplicate here, a field nobody filled in there, until nobody quite believes the numbers and everyone keeps their own version on the side.

Get the list looked at Ask a question first

Sound familiar?

Signs the list has drifted.

→

The same customer exists three times, spelled three different ways.

→

Nobody trusts the reports, so everyone keeps a private spreadsheet.

→

Half the records are missing the one field you now need.

→

People who left years ago are still listed as the contact.

→

You cannot tell which customers are actually still customers.

→

Sending anything to the whole list feels too risky to try.

A worked example

One customer, entered three times.

Matching on the name alone finds none of these. Matching on the phone number, the address and the order history finds all three, and nothing gets merged until you have said which version wins.

A worked example. The merge keeps every order, note and date from all three records, so the history survives the tidy up.
In the system today	Contact on the record	Last order
Northgate Joinery Ltd	Jo Hall	March
northgate joinery	(312) 555 0147	August
NORTHGATE JOINERY LTD.	J. Hall, accounts	June
Northgate Joinery Ltd	Jo Hall, (312) 555 0147	August

How it works

How we sort it out.

Nothing is deleted on a guess. Everything is copied first, and the judgement calls come to you.

Take a copy first

Before anything is touched, so there is always a way back to exactly how it was.

Find the duplicates

Matched on more than the name, because the same customer is rarely entered the same way twice.

Agree the rules with you

Which record wins when two disagree, and what counts as dead. Those are your decisions, not ours.

Merge and fill the gaps

Duplicates joined without losing history, and missing fields filled from whatever reliable source exists.

Set the dormant ones aside

Old records are parked rather than deleted, so the list is usable and the history survives.

Stop it happening again

The entry rules and checks that keep it clean, because a one-off cleanup drifts straight back.

Common questions

Questions owners usually ask.

Will we lose any history?

No. Duplicates are merged rather than deleted, dormant records are parked rather than removed, and there is a full copy from before we started.

Which systems do you work with?

The ones small businesses actually use, including Zoho, HubSpot, Airtable, and a fair number of spreadsheets that have been doing the job of a CRM for years.

How bad is too bad?

We have not met one yet that could not be sorted out. The messier it is, the more the first pass is worth, because that is where the biggest errors are hiding.

Can you keep it clean afterwards?

That is the part that matters. We set up the checks and entry rules that stop it drifting, and can keep an eye on it if you would rather not.

Do we have to stop using it while you work?

No. We work on a copy and bring the changes across, so the business keeps running the whole time.

Tell us how bad the list has got.

Describe what is in there and what you no longer trust. We will come back with what it would take to sort out.

Get the list looked at Just ask a question