Professional Services

Data Migration Service

Do you have data that needs to be imported? The easiest way is to use our free automated Donor Import feature

The Donor Import feature is great if you just have a list of donors in a spreadsheet. But what if your data is more complex? What if you need to import your historical donation records? For more advanced data import, automation will only get us so far. That's why we offer our Data Migration Service . We can take just about any type of data that you have, and import it into your Donor Tools system.

How much does it cost?

Data Migration Service costs $75 per hour (USD), plus applicable tax.

Why do we charge hourly?

Because everyone's data is different, we can't anticipate how long it will take to import any given database. If your data is in good shape, it may be a breeze to import. If it requires a lot of cleanup, then it can take longer.

What if we change our mind after our data is imported?

Data migration fees are non-refundable.

Garbage In Garbage Out

Data quality is extremely important. If your data is extremely consistent (e.g. first names are in the "First Name" column, etc.), then consider yourself lucky! Most data ends up with some irregularities - information in the wrong fields, missing information, etc. If this is the case, we'll need to spend some time normalizing your data before we can begin. The more you can clean up your data yourself, less time we'll have to spend importing it and fixing problems afterwards. This means validating email addresses, fixing spelling and formatting errors, and making sure that data is in the right fields.

What does the ideal data migration look like?

Here are the elements of the perfect migration situation:

  • Your data exists in two tables*: one table filled with donors, and the other filled with donations.
  • Each table has a header that describes the contents of each column.
  • The contents of each column is consistent (e.g. first names are in the "First Name" column, etc.)
  • The donors table has a primary key.
  • The donations table has a foreign key that references the donor's id.

If that doesn't describe your data, that's ok - we can still import it. It will just require a little more human intervention.

* A table can be a sheet in an Excel spreadsheet, a table in an Access or FileMaker database, or two separate text files in CSV format

What is CSV format?

CSV stands for Comma Separated Values. It's basically just a text file with special formatting. A CSV file usually has one row of text that describes the contents of the file, such as "First name, Last name, Address, City, State". Notice that the values are separated by commas. After the header row, the following rows would contain the actual data, separated by commas. Here's an example:

First name, Last name, Address, City, State, Postal Code, Country
Ryan, Heneise, 1234 5th St, Round Rock, TX, 78664, US
Joe, Donor, 5432 1st St, Auckland, 1150, NZ

Ready to get started?

  1. Email us at support@donortools.com or call 800-722-1492 and introduce yourself.
  2. We'll send you a contract. Sign the contract, and send it back.
  3. Email us your database file(s).
  4. We'll examine your files and give you an estimate.
  5. Approve the estimate, and we'll go to work.
  6. Your data will be imported into Donor Tools within a few days.