Messy contact data is the silent killer of good sales and marketing. If you’ve ever tried to run a campaign only to realize half your Salesforce contacts are outdated, duplicated, or just plain wrong, you know the pain. This guide is for anyone who actually wants their CRM to be useful—not a graveyard of bad emails and typos.
We'll walk through using Dropcontact, a tool built to clean, deduplicate, and standardize contact info in Salesforce automatically. I'll show you what works, what to watch out for, and how to avoid the usual pitfalls.
Why Bother Cleaning Salesforce Contacts?
Before we get technical, let’s be honest: most contact lists are junk. People move jobs, mistype their own names, or get entered twice by mistake. Here’s what happens when you ignore it:
- Your sales team wastes hours chasing dead leads.
- Marketing emails bounce, or worse, land you on spam lists.
- Reporting and segmentation become pointless.
Cleaning up your data isn’t glamorous, but it saves you money, time, and embarrassment. And if you want Salesforce automations to work, you need clean data. No way around it.
What Dropcontact Actually Does (and What It Doesn’t)
Dropcontact is an add-on that connects to Salesforce and automatically:
- Finds and merges duplicates (even tricky ones with slight spelling differences)
- Standardizes info (names, job titles, company names)
- Updates email addresses when people change jobs
- Enriches contacts with missing info (like LinkedIn profiles)
But—and this is important—it’s not a magic wand. Here’s what Dropcontact won’t do:
- Fix contacts that are total garbage (e.g., “asdf@asdf.com”)
- Make judgment calls for you on which data to keep if there’s a real conflict
- Clean up totally custom fields unless you map them
Treat it as a solid helper, not a replacement for human judgment.
Step 1: Back Up Your Salesforce Data
Seriously, do this first. Even the best tools can mess up or merge things you didn’t want. Export your contacts and accounts to a CSV or use Salesforce’s built-in data export tools. Keep that backup somewhere safe.
Pro tip: If you’re nervous, run Dropcontact on a test subset first. No shame in being careful.
Step 2: Connect Dropcontact to Salesforce
Setting up Dropcontact is pretty straightforward, but here’s what to expect:
- Sign up for a Dropcontact account if you haven’t already.
- Install the Dropcontact Salesforce integration. This usually means adding it from the Salesforce AppExchange and following the prompts.
- Authorize access. You’ll grant Dropcontact permission to read and update your Salesforce contacts and accounts. Yes, it needs this access to work—so make sure you know what data it will touch.
- Configure your settings. You decide which objects (Contacts, Leads, Accounts) to clean, and whether Dropcontact should auto-merge duplicates or just flag them.
Watch out for: If you have a complicated Salesforce setup (custom objects, lots of validation rules, etc.), you might need admin help.
Step 3: Set Your Cleaning and Standardization Rules
Here’s where Dropcontact stands out. You get to pick how aggressive it should be. Some suggestions:
- Duplicate detection: Go for “fuzzy” matching, so “Jon Smith” and “John Smith” get flagged.
- Standardization: Choose to force things like “First letter uppercase” for names, or standardize company names based on real business databases.
- Auto-enrichment: Decide if you want Dropcontact to fill in missing data like job titles or LinkedIn URLs. This is handy, but don’t expect 100% accuracy—always review.
- Email updates: Let Dropcontact update emails when a contact’s domain changes (like after a job move). This is useful, but sometimes lags behind real-life changes.
Don’t bother: Trying to clean every custom field or super-niche info. Focus on what your team actually uses—usually emails, names, job titles, and company names.
Step 4: Run Your First Cleaning Pass
Hit the “start” button (or whatever Dropcontact calls it). The tool will process your data in batches, flagging duplicates, suggesting merges, and standardizing fields.
What to expect:
- You’ll get a report showing what’s been cleaned, merged, and enriched.
- Some contacts will get merged automatically, others will need a manual review.
- Standardization is fast, but enrichment (finding missing data) can take longer, especially if you’re cleaning thousands of records.
Pro tip: Don’t try to fix everything at once. Run a small batch, check the results, then scale up.
Step 5: Review and Approve Changes
This is where most people get lazy—and regret it later. Take the time to:
- Review suggested merges. Dropcontact is good, but it’s not perfect. Sometimes two “John Smiths” are actually different people.
- Check newly enriched data. Sometimes job titles or emails can be out of date or pulled from sketchy sources. Trust, but verify.
- Undo or tweak anything that looks wrong before finalizing.
Shortcuts worth skipping: Don’t manually check every single contact, but do spot checks on high-value records—your top accounts, key leads, etc.
Step 6: Set Up Ongoing Automation
One cleaning pass is never enough. If you want to keep your data clean:
- Schedule regular runs. Dropcontact can run daily, weekly, or monthly to keep things tidy.
- Set up alerts. Get notified when a lot of duplicates are found or when enrichment rates drop (a sign something’s off).
- Train your team. Even the best tools can’t fix bad user habits. Make sure everyone knows how to enter clean data in the first place.
What Works Well with Dropcontact
- Deduplication: It’s genuinely better than Salesforce’s built-in tools, especially for fuzzy matches.
- Standardization: You’ll finally see consistent formats—no more “john DOE” or “Acme, Inc vs Acme Inc.”
- Hands-off enrichment: It can fill in a lot of blanks, saving your team hours.
What Doesn’t (or What to Watch Out For)
- Custom fields: If you rely on lots of custom fields, Dropcontact might not touch them unless you set it up specifically.
- Enrichment accuracy: It’s pretty good, but not perfect. Don’t treat enriched data as gospel.
- Heavy custom setups: Integrations can get weird if your Salesforce is heavily customized. Expect to do some testing.
Ignore the Hype: Keep It Simple
Don’t get distracted by promises of “100% clean data forever.” That’s not realistic. Focus on:
- Cleaning the fields you actually use.
- Running regular, small cleanups instead of giant, risky overhauls.
- Teaching your team the basics of good data entry.
Salesforce is only as smart as the data you feed it. Use Dropcontact to get things in shape, but don’t expect miracles. Stay practical, keep things simple, and iterate. Your future self (and your sales team) will thank you.