Migrating from another platform

Coming from another platform, you do not have to start from scratch: one spreadsheet brings each person with what they already had there, including badges and points, so nobody loses what they earned. Old posts come through another spreadsheet, with their original date and author.

Role: owner or admin.

#What you can bring

#Before importing

1. Build the structure: sections, spaces and groups. See Build the structure.
2. Create the badges in Administration › Engagement, Badges view, New badge, with the same names as on the old platform. Only badges in the catalog come in: a name that does not exist blocks the import until you create it or mark it to be ignored. See The catalog.
3. Turn on gamification and, if you want, set up the levels. With it off, the spreadsheet's points are ignored.
4. Export the spreadsheet from the old platform, as .xlsx or .csv, one row per person.

#The sample spreadsheet

Download the sample spreadsheet (.csv) and replace it with your data:

• Badges: several in the same cell, separated by ;. A comma can be part of a name. Case and accents do not matter.
• Points: a whole number from 1 to 100,000. 1.500, 1,500 and 250.0 are accepted; empty or 0 gives no points. A value with decimals (12.5) or that is not a number is invalid: the person comes in without the points, with a warning on the row.

#Importing

1. Administration › Members, Invite Members, Import spreadsheet tab.
2. Write the List origin (Members from the old platform), choose the file and go on to Columns.
3. Send each column to its target: Email to E-mail, First name and Last name, Job title, Group to Groups, Badges to Badges, Points to Initial points and Agreed to join to Consent, with Yes counting as yes.
4. In the Summary, check the badges that are not in the catalog (create or ignore them), the invalid points, who already got points from another import and which level people will land on.
5. Import.

#What happens

• New people get the e-mail invite with Set my password, as in any import; existing members get nothing.
• Badges and points arrive silently: no e-mail or bell notice, and no workflow fires (Received a badge, Moved up a level, Reached N points). The badge-received webhook does go out, with the import origin.
• Points only once per person, across every import: if you import again, whoever already got them does not get them again.
• Whoever already holds the badge keeps it.
• Each person's level comes from the points. People arriving through the import have no weekly activity yet, so a level that requires activity only comes once they take part.

#Example

A community of 1,200 people leaves another platform. Beforehand, it creates the badges Founder, Mentor and First post in the catalog and turns gamification on. The spreadsheet has a Beta tester badge that no longer exists: in the summary, they mark it to be ignored. The summary shows 900 people on level 1, 280 on level 3 and 20 on level 5. They import: invites go out, badges and points show on each profile, and nobody gets a badge notice.

#Common errors and how to fix them

#Related

• Import members from a spreadsheet
• Importing content from a spreadsheet
• Engagement and badges
• Gamification