When choosing to merge two duplicate contacts, you can pick specific information from each contact to keep. However, when merging multiple duplicate contacts, you do not have the option to pick specific information from each contact. In order to keep track of information that is not being retained when performing a multiple contact duplicate merge, InterAction creates Retained Data activities.
When merging multiple duplicate contacts, data can be “lost” because the good version of the contact always takes precedence over the duplicate version of the contact. Whenever information conflicts, the information from the good version will be used and the information from the duplicate version will not be added to the contact, but will be recorded in an activity for the contact.
For example, assume the good contact contains “Jane” for the first name, and the duplicate contact contains the misspelled name “Jayne.” Because the good contact takes precedence, the value in the duplicate contact, “Jayne,” will not be added to the good contact. Instead, an activity is added to the contact for Jane that indicates the name “Jayne” was lost in the merge.
For detailed scenarios showing how duplicate merge combines information, see How Multi-Contact Duplicate Merge Combines Data.
When correcting a duplicate link, data is only lost if the good version of the contact already has a value for the field.
For example, if the good version of the contact already has a value for the folder-specific additional field “spouse,” and the duplicate version has a different value for the same field, the good version will be kept and the duplicate version will be recorded in a retained data activity.
Because correcting a duplicate link only merges folder-specific data, this can only happen if the good version of the contact has already been linked into the same folder as the duplicate version.
Retained Data Activities for Data Lost During a Duplicate Merge
All retained information is saved into a retained data activity. Retained data activities are created on the good version of the contact or the link. If necessary, you can copy the information in the activity back into the contact.