Importing data to Dynamics CRM can seem easy by using Data Management tools included in the CRM and mapping simply data in your files to Dynamics Fields. However, I’ve recently had to import some Accounts and Contacts Data that cannot be imported separately because of the native relation between these 2 entities. Making a separate import will not link your Accounts to their Contacts and Contacts to their Companies. Thus, to succeed importing complete Accouns and Contacts Data, making a compressed package is necessary.

First let’s give a brief reminder about the supported formats for data import in Dynamics CRM with the maximum file size allowed for each format:

• Comma-separated values (.csv) [Maximum 8MB];
• Text (.txt) [Maximum 8MB];
• Excel Spreadsheet 2003 (.xml) [Maximum 8MB];
• Compressed (.zip) [Maximum 32MB].

When your data is ready and in the right format, make a zip package of your Accounts and Contacts files and launch the Dynamics CRM Import Data Wizard.

Once your zip package is uploaded, the Import Data Wizard gives you an upload summary with information about files contained in your package  (As you can see in my example my zip package’s name is crm.zip and it contains two files in the csv format : “Accounts.csv” and “Contacts.csv”). Before going next, make sure you’ve selected the right Field and Data Delimiters.

You’ll next asked to select System Data Maps, choose SampleDataMap if you think fields names in your files are not exactly the same as Dynamics ones. Click next and match your source data files with Dynamics CRM Record Types as you can see below.

Now finally you can map all your fields belonging to both Account and Contact entities by ensuring that data will complete and every record from each entity will have exactly the right information.

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Please don’t hesitate to leave a comment if you have any suggestion or if you find something inaccurate in this post.