Import leads from a spreadsheet
Bring in leads from a CSV or Excel file, or an export from another app, with a check of every row and Undo for 24 hours.
Have leads in a spreadsheet or another app? Import them into Leads in a few steps. Leads is included with Viremail Business.
What you can import
- CSV and TSV files, with commas, semicolons, tabs or bars between columns, in UTF-8, UTF-16 or the older Windows encoding. Accents come out right.
- Excel files (.xlsx). The first sheet is imported. For an older .xls file, open it in Excel and save it as .xlsx or CSV first.
- Exports from Facebook lead forms, HubSpot, Pipedrive, Zoho, Salesforce and Google work as they are.
- Up to 50,000 rows a file. Starting from scratch? Open Import and choose Download the template.
Import a file
- In Leads, choose Import in the side panel.
- Drop your file in, or choose it. Large files are read in the background, so you can keep working.
- Columns: each column is matched to a lead field by its name, such as E-mail, Mobile, Organisation or Lead status. Change any of them, send a column to a Custom field with a name you pick, or choose Don’t import. If the column names aren’t on the first row, pick the row they’re on. Your choices are remembered for the next file with the same columns.
- Review: you see how the first rows will be saved, with anything odd marked: an email address that isn’t one, a phone number without a country, a date that doesn’t exist. Rows with an error aren’t imported; for anything else only the odd value is left out. Choose Problem report to download every row with a problem and what it is.
- Pick the options, then choose Import. You can stop part way; what was sent stays.
Options
| Option | What it does |
|---|---|
| Leads you already have | Skip them, Fill in empty fields (nothing is replaced), or Replace with the file (empty cells never clear anything). Tags are only ever added. |
| New leads start in | The stage for new leads, unless the file has a stage column. |
| Source and name | Where the leads came from, such as a fair or a referral, and a name for the import that shows on each lead. |
| Add tags, Assign to | Tags for every imported lead, and who looks after them. |
| Phone numbers without a country code | The country used to turn 07700 900123 into +44 7700 900123. |
| Dates like 03/04/2026 | Whether the day or the month comes first. |
| Amounts without a currency | The currency for values such as 2,500. £, €, $ and ₹ in a cell are understood. |
| Mark as seen | On by default, so a big import doesn’t fill the red count on Leads. |
How duplicates are found
A row is the same person as a lead you have when the email address matches, or else the phone number. A row without an email address is also matched by name and company. Rows repeated in the file are found the same way. A new lead needs an email address, so a row without one can only update a lead you already have.
Undo an import
For 24 hours after an import, Undo import removes the leads it added and puts back the fields it changed. If you changed one of those fields since, your change is kept. You find Undo on the summary and under Recent imports in the importer, with a Problems download for rows that weren’t imported.