Perform a system upload

Add or update members' profile information and system variables, including memberstatus.

Prerequisites:
  • Only use this method to add members who have already consented to joining your community. Adding emails from people who have not consented may violate anti-spam legislation. For more information, see Alida External Sample Waiver.
  • Create a comma-separated values (CSV) file that meets CSV file requirements.
  • You may need to include a column called Community. Include this column if:
    • You have multiple communities and you are adding new members.
    • You are changing the communities to which members belong.
    • You have multiple communities and you are adding nonmembers as invitation recipients.

    Be careful while you are editing Community values to avoid accidentally overwriting these values for active members.

  • You may need to include a MemberId column that contains members' unique Community member IDs. Include this column if you are updating members' email addresses.
Tip: To avoid CSV import errors, review your CSV file in a text editor, and delete any blank rows or rows without email addresses.
Note:
  • Admins can perform this task. To perform this task as a Power User, you must have Can access sensitive data enabled.

The system upload feature functions like a normal CSV import by letting you update members and profile variables, except it also lets you create new members and update system variables.

  1. Open the Community app.
  2. Perform a system upload by doing one of the following:
    • In the Community toolbar, select Community > Member Groups.
    • In the Community toolbar, select Community > Profile Variables.
    • In the Community toolbar, select Community > Members.
  3. On the Community toolbar, click System Upload.
  4. Click Choose File, select a CSV file to import, and click Open.
    Result: The CSV file name appears.
  5. Optional: Select Exclude members found in the csv file to exclude active community members from your upload.
    Tip: Use this option when your CSV file contains both non-members and active members. Excluding active members prevents you from changing a member's information, such as their profile variable values or the community they belong to.

    Non-members are included in the upload regardless of whether this option is selected or cleared.

  6. Click Upload.
    Result:

    A notification message about the status of your CSV file appears in the notification center at the top right of the page.

    The application matches profile variables to members using the values in the MemberId or Email columns. The system first looks for the MemberId column in the CSV file and uses the MemberId values if possible. If the CSV file does not contain MemberId, the system then looks for the Email column and matches profile variables based on members' email addresses.

    The application updates member and profile variable values to match what is in the system upload CSV file.

    The application automatically deletes listings for failed imports after 30 days.