Bouncing from campaign to campaign, contacts can pile up quickly! Especially if you find yourself working with large campaigns, it can be tricky to figure out how to stay organized. Here are a few ways to clean up your contacts and keep your portal under control.

Tip 1. Delete Unsubscribers/Spam Reports

It's a hard truth, but no matter how great your message is - not everyone wants to hear from you. Make a clean break by deleting everyone that's unsubscribed from your communications or marked your ThankViews as spam. To clear out these contacts:

1. Navigate to your Contacts page.
2. Locate and select the Filter By dropdown immediately above your database.
3. Deselect all checkboxes EXCEPT Unsubscribed Email, Unsubscribed Phone, and Spam Report. The contacts will appear greyed out with a tiny icon depicting a person beside an X.
4. Click the bulk selection checkbox in the upper-left side of your list's header to select the isolated contacts.
5. A red Delete button will appear above your database, click to delete.

If you desire, you can also extend this sweep to include contacts with low engagement scores. You can do this in step 3 by selecting the 1-star checkbox in your filter dropdown and deleting people that aren't interacting with your communications.

Tip 2. Investigate and Update Bounced Contacts

It can be tempting to delete contacts that have bounced, as a bounce insinuates that the email address is invalid or phone number may be wrong. Deletion is an option, but alternatively, you can combat this issue by generating a list of all bounced constituents and then double-checking your organization's larger database or CRM, making updates as needed. To generate this list:

1. Navigate to your Contacts page.
2. Locate and select the Filter By dropdown immediately above your database.
3. Deselect all checkboxes EXCEPT Bounced Email and Bounced Phone to isolate your bounced contacts.
4. Click the ellipses button immediately above your database header and select Download .CSV.

Now that you have everyone in one place, not only can you check your addresses/phone numbers against where your main data lives, you can also consider reaching out to those constituents to verify that their information is correct. You can send an email to capture phone number changes or ask for cell numbers instead of landlines, make individuals calls to check for email typos, etc.

Tip 3. Keep Your Data Consistent 

Did you know we offer a spreadsheet template to help you align your data with the fields in your portal? We recommend using this document, but creating your own template is cool too - the keyword here is consistency. Use the same formatting for each spreadsheet that you upload to keep things need and cohesive across contacts. To access that template of fields in your portal:

1. Navigate to your Campaigns page.
2. Select any campaign in your portal.
3. Click the blue Add Recipients button above your list header.
4. Select the Spreadsheet Upload tab if not already selected.
5. Under the heading of this dialogue box, you'll see "Need a CSV template? Download here" - click the download link!

Now you can save this to your computer and use it for reference when formatting future spreadsheets.

Tip 4. Utilize Lists as You Go

If you have segments you plan to send multiple campaigns to, using Lists is a no-brainer! You'll save yourself time (and unnecessary spreadsheet uploads) by dropping those recipients into a List before you start building your campaign. Make sure you name your Lists using consistent naming conventions so that you'll be able to easily identify their contents! Check out our article on Creating and Using Lists.

Tip 5. Download Metrics Before Deleting Contacts

You can delete contacts from your portal, but that will also delete their metrics, so be sure to download your metrics beforehand. If you just want to delete a contact from a certain campaign, make sure you do so in the Recipients section of your campaign and not in the Contacts page. This will delete them from just that single campaign and not affect their metrics. Reach out to your Customer Success Representative or success@thankview.com for mass deleting contacts.

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If you have additional questions, please reach out to your Customer Success Representative or support@thankview.com.