Import contacts from a .CSV or Excel file

Importing contacts in one go saves you a lot of time and effort.

Your contact list file may have as many custom fields as you like, such as date of birth, address, job title, etc. TextMagic lets you use these custom fields as tags, to send personalized mail merge text messages to the relevant Lists. Mail merge tags allow you to dynamically add the content to your text messages.

There are two ways to import contacts to TextMagic:

• Upload an Excel or CSV file;
• Paste numbers from clipboard.

Number formatting before import

If all your contact numbers are from the same country, you can leave them in a local format, i.e without the country code:

• US number  - (904) 654-1669
• UK number - 07937 946700
• AU number - 0448 793 610

If your contact list consists of numbers from several countries, please ensure that numbers are in the international format with country codes and no spaces or plus signs:

• US number - 19046541669
• UK number - 447937946700
• Australian number - 61448793610

To import contacts from an Excel or CSV file:

1. Select the Lists tab.
2. Click New contact button.
3. Select Import multiple contacts. 
4. Select Upload a file with phone numbers: Excel or CSV file.
5. Choose the file you want to import from your computer and click Continue. 
6. Select the country. If your contacts are from different countries, make sure a country code is included with each number in your Excel sheet.
   
   
7. Select the list where you want the contacts to be added and click Continue.
   Please note: If your Excel file has a 'List' column and you match it during the import session (see Step 3), our system will automatically create lists and add relevant contacts to these lists.
   
8. Now you will see a preview of your imported data. Match the Excel file columns with their respective TextMagic contact fields and click Continue. 

Your import session will now start. You will see your import preview and results in the next step.

Once the import session is completed, you will receive an email to your account email address. You can also monitor the progress of your import session if you stay on the same page.

To paste numbers from a clipboard:

1. Select the Lists tab.
2. Click New contact.
3. Select Import multiple contacts.
4. Select Copy and paste phone numbers.
5. Copy and paste your numbers into the box and click Continue.
   Please make sure:
   • numbers are separated with commas or spaces; or
   • you have one number per line/column.
6. Select the country option.
7. Click Add contacts to a list. If you choose not to, our system will create a new list automatically. 

Your import session will start now. You will see your import preview and results in the next step.

Once the import session is completed, you will receive an email to your account email address. You can also monitor the progress of your import session if you stay on the same page.

To check import results:

1. Select the Import tab.
2. Click on the desired import session and review the contacts under the Imported, Duplicates excluded, and Failed tabs. 

To avoid confusion, TextMagic does not import contacts that contain duplicate phone numbers. TextMagic imports these contacts only once, so that every contact number is unique.

To fix contacts that failed to import:

1. Select the Failed tab.
2. Click Edit next to each failed number. 
3. Correct the number.

4. Click Save.
Contacts will automatically move to the Imported tab after being fixed and will join the other successfully imported contacts.