Merging (Deduping) Records

Considerations

This article reviews data implications when records are merged, and addresses how Full Circle Funnel Metrics might update records during merging.

There are two key areas to consider:

• Campaign Member Metrics
• Lead/Contact status and active Funnel Metrics

This how-to explains how Funnel Metrics updates records on merge. It also offers recommendations to take into consideration when starting a large data cleanup project. We'll begin with some background.

What happens when records are ‘Deduped’ or ‘Merged’?

Let’s simplify our terminology: Deduping a record is a record Merge. Whether you are engaging in a big data cleanup project removing duplicate records, or doing one-off duplicate merging, the result in Salesforce is that the surviving record may get some of the data from the non-surviving records. This is what is meant by "merge" in this case. Unlike in a true merge, however, the non-surviving records are deleted. The choice of which record survives depends on the person doing the merge. The surviving record is often described as the ‘Master’ record.

By definition, record merges represent data loss because non-surviving records are deleted. Where you once had two leads, you now have one lead.

What about child records like Tasks and Campaign Members?

Child objects typically transfer to the surviving record.

What about duplicate Campaign Member Records?

If merged records are members of the same campaign, then one of the campaign member records will be deleted. Which record is deleted is not consistent, but we have seen the older record most often preserved. Unlike most records, these campaign members are not stored in the Trash Can when they are deleted, so they are not recoverable either manually or with Apex.

This matters because Campaign Members are the data hub for Funnel Metrics Funnel Reporting. If you perform a large data cleanup, your funnel metrics will go down because campaign member records will be destroyed.

The only campaign member we try to preserve is the case where a campaign member was associated with an opportunity (via the Opportunity Name lookup field). We keep a copy of this campaign member in XML format in the opportunity AdminCMArcive field (API Name: FCRM__FCR_Admin_CMArchive__c). When Funnel Metrics detects the deletion of this campaign member, it will attempt to re-insert it (potentially as a repeat campaign/member). If it cannot do so, it will add a member to the Full Circle System Campaign that is configured in the Funnel Metrics General settings tab.

Active Status and Active Response Considerations

In choosing the master record during a merge, the decision can often be based on the lead or contact status. Irrespective of which status value you select, Funnel Metrics may make status values.

Remember that Funnel Metrics considers lead/contact status values to be Active or Not Active. An example of an Active Status would be a value such as Working, and an example of an inactive Status value would be a value such as Remarket.

Go to your Funnel Metrics Status Configuration page and review how Funnel Metrics evaluates status values.

Here is an example of a status configuration with active and inactive status values.

Active status values have a natural progression. In the example above the progression is Open - Not Contacted > Attempting Contact > Working… At which point it progresses to Active Opportunity, or the engagement will end in Disqualified or Nurture.

Active Responses

When a lead or contact has an active status (pre-Opportunity), and also has a campaign member response with the corresponding Response Status value - we say that the lead/contact has an ‘Active Response’.

A lead or contact can only have ONE active response at a time. An active Response is NOT associated with an opportunity

In the example below the lead’s active status of ‘Marketing Qualified’ corresponds to the Active Response’s Response Status of ‘Marketing Qualified’

If your org is running in passive mode, or has passive users, it’s possible to have a lead or contact with an active status without a corresponding active response.

Opportunity-Active Responses

When a contact has a response that is associated with an open opportunity, we call this an Opportunity-Active Response.

A contact may be associated with multiple open opportunities - each one associated to a unique Opportunity-Active campaign member response.

Whether a contact can have an additional ‘Active Response’ (one not associated with an opportunity) when it has one or more ‘Opportunity-Active Response’, depends on the Contact Response rules in the Response Processing section.

In the screenshot below, for example, an additional active response is allowed on a contact with an Opportunity-Active response only if the campaign is a Response Prompt Campaign. Be sure to review your settings.

The contact below has an opportunity-active response. The contact status is the configured status in the status settings ‘Contact status when converted with Opportunity’.

Contact Record:

The Opportunity-Active campaign member Response Status

The Opportunity-Active response references an open opportunity in the Opportunity Name Lookup field:

Status Merge Outcomes

Consider our status mapping, where Attempting Contact or Working are status values more ‘progressed’ than Open - Not Contacted. During a merge operation you may decide to select the more progressed status value, but that may not be the merge outcome, because Funnel Metrics will make some decisions on which status to preserve based on the following:

1. Is the user doing the merge running in passive mode? (either the org is passive, the user is passive or the record types are passive)
2. Does 1 or more of the records being merged have 1 or more active responses?
3. Does the record have an Opportunity-Active response and is an additional response allowed?
4. Is the Surviving record type defined as a non-response record type?

About Non-Response Record Types

Non-Response Record Types are defined in General Settings and are excluded from all Funnel Metrics processing.

1. If you are merging Non-Response Record Types the lead or contact status you select will be persisted. Funnel Metrics won’t touch these records.
2. If you are merging other record types that are not Non-Response Record types, and the surviving record is a Non-Response Record type - any existing Active Responses will be shut down and the Response Status will be updated to Resolved - Non-Response RT.

Merge Scenarios - Same Record

Merging records can be

1. Lead to Lead
2. Contact to Contact
3. Lead to Contact (Lead Conversion)

Below is a table of the merge scenarios and the outcomes of the merge for the same type ( lead to lead, or contact to contact merges).

This is not all of the possible scenarios but should be enough background for you to understand the general behavior. You can see in this document that we differentiate between an active status with a corresponding active response, and a record with an active status without a corresponding active response (this can happen in Orgs with passive record types or users)

Recommendations

It’s safe to make decisions about which inactive status values will win during a merge.

For merges with one or more active status values, while you may make a choice, be advised that the outcome may differ from the status value you select in the merge.

We recommend that during deduping and cleanup you consider merging in the following order

1. Do same record merges first
2. Before merging - consider which active status values should be deactivated because they are old - first shut down those leads and contacts by updating them to your selected inactive status values
3. During merge - you can select an inactive status value if all of the records are inactive, but if one of the records is active, that will be the selected outcome (unless the surviving record type is a non-response record type.
4. Next see lead conversion merge scenarios next

Merge Scenarios - Lead Conversion

When merging leads to contacts you are converting the lead. Below are lead conversion scenarios and outcomes. As in the previous section, this is not a collection of all possible scenarios but a subset to explain the general outcomes to expect during this type of merging.

Recommendations

• Look at your status mapping configuration to understand what the status outcomes will be
• Look at your configuration on whether or not a contact is allowed to have an additional active response if it has an opportunity-active response - this will determine conversion outcomes
  

We recommend that during deduping and cleanup you consider merging lead conversion into contacts in the following order

1. Do this AFTER same record merges
2. Before merging - consider which active status values should be deactivated because they are old - first shut down those leads and contacts by updating them to your selected inactive status values
3. During merge - you can select an inactive status value if all of the records are inactive, but if one of the records is active, that will be the selected outcome (unless the surviving record type is a non-response record type.
4. For active status values - do not explicitly update the contact status post lead conversion - let Funnel Metrics configuration handle those updates

What's Next

If you have specific questions about your configuration please reach out by filing a case in the customer portal.