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by Lauren Ryan on July 2024
One of the biggest issues for people managing a CRM is having duplicate records. It may not seem like a big deal, but a dirty list affects your reporting, personalization, and monthly subscription costs.
Duplicate records are defined as two or more records relating to the same thing that do not necessarily contain the same information. For example, you may have multiple Contacts relating to the same person, but each may have different email addresses.
Duplicates are an issue in any CRM, but the HubSpot Salesforce integration is prone to duplicates because you have many moving parts, including data syncing between platforms and differing matching rules for duplicates.
There Are Three Main Ways Duplicates are Created in the Hubspot Salesforce Integration
Salesforce Leads and Contacts Sync to HubSpot Contacts
It’s really obvious how other Objects, like Deals and Opportunities, sync in the integration. However, both Leads and Contacts in Salesforce map to one Contact object in HubSpot. This is a little sneaky if you’re not familiar with the integration. One common route to duplicate creation is when teams create multiple Leads or Contact records for one person in Salesforce with the same email address. HubSpot does not allow duplicate records with the same email address. So, whichever record in Salesforce is most recently updated with that email address and is visible to the HubSpot integration user will sync with HubSpot.
Duplicate Rules Are Managed Differently in HubSpot and Salesforce
HubSpot duplicate rules are finite, meaning you can't change them. Contacts are de-duplicated by email address, meaning you can't create multiple records for the same email. Duplicate Companies are identified by their company domain.
Instead, Salesforce duplicate rules are flexible, meaning your Salesforce admin can control the criteria and which scenarios can override them. In other words, your Salesforce admin can define what a duplicate is and isn’t in your account.
HubSpot Will Not Allow Two Contacts to Have the Same Email Address
When you try to create a record in HubSpot that already has an existing email, HubSpot displays this error message.
In Salesforce, if you try to create a record with an existing email, you'll see an alert that says there’s a similar record. But you can click Save Again. Have your Salesforce admin change the setting to Don't allow override to prevent this.
Integrations also override this function. If you have an API integration that does not build in checking for duplicates, it will override the setting and push the record through.
How to Prevent Duplicates
Prevention is the most important step in actually solving your problem with duplicates. There are two ways to go about it.
First, Require a Website URL for Salesforce Accounts
HubSpot prevents duplicate Companies by comparing URLs in the Company Domain property, so this step is essential. However, requiring a URL is not a default setting in Salesforce, so your admin will need to make it a required field.
Many people object to requiring a URL because it’s one more field for sales reps to fill out. Similarly, marketers don’t want the URL field in a form because they fear it will reduce submission rates.
When adding the company URL, you can either do it manually or use different avenues like ZoomInfo to automate it.
We have built custom solutions for teams hoping to avoid manually inputting the URL. The HubSpot Salesforce Integration Certification Course teaches you how we’ve automated this, so you can do it too!
Ideally, your Salesforce accounts will have the URL before you integrate both systems. If not, you can export a report of all your accounts missing a website URL and assign your team to update the URLs, either directly in the Salesforce record or in the report you exported as a spreadsheet. From there, you can import those records again to update this information.
Second, Don't Allow Override for Salesforce Duplicate Rules
Admins often resist this, especially if they’re used to working in an organization that intentionally creates duplicate Leads. If we're used to creating multiple Leads for all new form submissions, we don't want to override duplicates because that's how we get our new leads, right? If this is you, you might want to change that.
We recommend shifting to an opportunity-based inquiry model for the HubSpot Salesforce integration and ditching the Lead object altogether for many reasons.
To change your settings to prevent override, you’ll need an org-wide conversation because changing this setting can have many implications for other integrations or tools.
How to Deduplicate Records
The first option is to do it manually. That’s probably ok for a handful of records, but you will probably need a more efficient solution. Next, HubSpot Operations Hub is foolproof if you only want to de-duplicate in HubSpot, but it won’t help fix any duplicate issues with Salesforce records.
Identify the Origin of Your Duplicates
A more long-term solution is to identify how your duplicates are being created and prevent creation in the first place. Let’s run through an example.
We have two Contacts, Stephen and Sean, and a Company, PIC - all created in Salesforce and synced to HubSpot. You can find your Contact information under Activity > Filter Activity in the Salesforce Embed.
In this case, Stephen filled out a form and came to HubSpot as a Contact. So, he kept the association with his Salesforce account when submitting the form. Notice that the Domain field, which we talked about before, is empty. When this company was created in Salesforce, the Website field remained empty, so nothing synced to HubSpot.
Next, Sean is also a Contact created through a form submission. This time, the Domain field has a website URL. The name Pic is different from Stephen’s record - PIC. Since Stephen’s record didn’t have a website, there are now two companies.
In cases like this, you have two options. Either your team monitors new Contacts and associates them with the correct account, or you can make URLs a required field.
Stop Using the Lead Object
Another typical scenario happens when teams continue to use the Lead object in Salesforce. As a reminder, Salesforce Contacts and Leads both sync to the Contact object in HubSpot; the thing is, you can only select one OR the other to create new records in Salesforce when setting up the integration, not both. So if a form submission creates a new Lead in Salesforce and a new Contact with an associated Company in HubSpot, you will have a duplicate.
If you want to continue working with Leads, you can correct this by turning off the setting Create or Associate Companies with Contact. Doing so will prevent new companies from being created when a Contact doesn’t match an existing Company through a domain. All Account creation will happen in Salesforce.
PS - You don’t need to keep using the Lead object. Instead, you can shift to Opportunity-based inquiry management for HubSpot and Salesforce.
Ensure Your Field Types Are Correct
A client recently came to us with a large number of duplicate Companies, seemingly out of the blue. When we checked, we found that the Company Name in their forms was a Company property.
When creating forms, you want to ensure all of your fields are Contact properties to avoid creating unwanted duplicate Companies in HubSpot.
Check Your Property Mappings
Another common way to create duplicate companies is by mapping the Company website field in Salesforce to the wrong field in HubSpot.
The standard mapping syncs Salesforce’s Website URL with HubSpot's Website URL. However, this Website URL property has nothing to do with HubSpot deduplication. You want to map your Domain Name in HubSpot to your Website in Salesforce. Also, set it to sync both ways, so if HubSpot updates it, it'll sync to Salesforce and vice versa.
Edit Duplicates in Your Integration
Whenever you are in the Contact or Company screen in HubSpot, you can go to Actions > Manage Duplicates, and a new screen will open for you to manage your duplicate records. There’s a number there that shows you how many duplicates you have. If your report says 10,000, chances are you have more duplicates than that, as HubSpot will only surface 10,000 duplicates at a time. In these cases, we recommend using a tool like Insycle to get a full view of your account health and merge duplicate records in bulk.
When reviewing your duplicates, you want to determine which is your duplicate record and which is your master record. The master record is typically the one syncing to Salesforce and the one you want to keep.
When looking at Companies, the typical duplicate scenario consists of an Account created in Salesforce and a Company created in HubSpot that was not and has never been in Salesforce. So, whenever you need to identify a duplicate Company, look for the one with a Salesforce ID and delete the one that doesn't. The easiest way is to visit your Managed Duplicate screen and click Select Properties to review. You want to find the Salesforce Account ID and the Last Salesforce Sync Time here. We also like to include the source data and the number of associated Contacts when reviewing these Companies.
To do this in HubSpot, you’ll have to manually extract any data you want to keep and delete the duplicate because there’s no way to merge it.
If you find associated Contacts on the Company record you need to delete, you can use Associ8 by Hapily to associate the Contacts to the correct Company record.
Need help with these steps? Module 6 of the HubSpot Salesforce Integration Certification Course walks you through duplicates in the HubSpot Salesforce integration from start to finish. You’ll have access to walkthrough videos teaching you how to:
- Manually deduplicate records in HubSpot and Salesforce
- Deduplicate records in HubSpot and Salesforce in bulk using Insycle
- Leverage Hapily to correctly associate Contacts to Companies in HubSpot and eliminate duplicate Companies in HubSpot
Final Words on Duplicate Records
As you see, managing duplicates is not to be taken lightly. A proactive approach will keep your data pristine and save you countless headaches regarding duplicate records.
There are three ways we recommend you keep an eye on your duplicates from an administrative perspective.
First, the Managed Duplicates section in HubSpot lets you see where your duplicates are for Contacts and Companies and manage them on one screen.
Second, Salesforce does not have a native report for duplicate Records, but you can create a custom Salesforce report type with these instructions.
Third, use a third-party tool like Insycle to ensure your systems are in tip-top condition. Get a step-by-step walkthrough of how to use Insycle and our other duplicate management approaches in the HubSpot Salesforce Integration Certification Course.
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