Primary Key

·         You must select a single field to be the Primary Key field (eg: CustomerID or PersonID or AccountNumber or ContactID, etc…  Whatever is the unique identifier across all your records). 

·         This field contains a unique identifier that will be used to identify all updates and merges when you export the cleaned data at the end of the process.

·         The Primary Key can be any type of data (integer or string) – provided it is unique across all records (i.e. a name field could not be used as names cannot be guaranteed to be unique).

Text (Manual Merge)

·         This should be used for all Person Names, Company Names, Address, Zip, State, Email and Phone Number fields – as these cannot be automatically merged together when there is conflicting data.

·         Use this option when in doubt about which data type should be used.

·         When a merge is required between two records, this field will behave in the following way:

o   When there is no conflicting data between the records in this field: The data remains unchanged.

o   Where there is conflicting (or different) data between the records in this field (E.g. A name is spelled differently across the two records) then you will have to manually merge the two records.  (I.e. Decide which is the correct spelling and keep that name – this cannot be automated because it requires human input).

Text (Concatenate Merge)

·         This should be used for any Notes or Free-text fields, also for any fields that can be concatenated together without making nonsense data.

·         When there is conflicting data between duplicate records in this field, you have the following options:

o   Manually merging the data (editing the records to get the value you want) – this requires manual editing.

o   Or concatenating the data (stringing the values together, end-to-end, separated by something like a full-stop, comma, or carriage return).  This can be automated – so records can be automatically merged together.

Number

·         This should be used for all Numeric data.  Merging can be automated by selecting the minimum, maximum, average or sum of the two values between duplicate records.  You set this option in the next step.

Date/Time

·         This should be used for all Date or Time data.  Merging can be automated by selecting the minimum or maximum date/time to keep.  You set this option in the next step.

True/False

·         This should be used for all True/False or Yes/No data.  Merging can be automated by keeping the common value, or when there is conflicting data by giving preference to either true or false.  You set this preference in the next step.