Import customers from CSV or Excel

Bulk-create octoja customers by uploading a CSV or Excel file and mapping its columns to customer fields.

Written By Stefan Steuer

Last updated 28 days ago

Instead of adding customers one at a time, you can create many at once from a spreadsheet. octoja reads a CSV or Excel file, lets you match its columns to customer fields, and creates the matching customers in a single step.

The file is parsed in your browser and is never uploaded — only the rows you map are sent to octoja.

Before you start

You need the Customer Management permission. Have your spreadsheet ready as a .csv or .xlsx file. A single import handles up to 1000 rows; split larger lists into several files.

Steps

Click Customers in the left sidebar.
Open the Actions menu (the ... button) in the top right.
Choose Import Customers.
Drop your file onto the dialog, or click to choose a .csv or .xlsx file.
Check that First row contains headers matches your file. When it is on, octoja treats the first row as column titles and auto-maps columns whose headers it recognises.
Review the column mapping. For each customer field, pick which spreadsheet column it should read from, or leave it as — Ignore —. Name is the only required field, so a column must be mapped to it before you can continue.
Check the preview of the first rows, then click the import button to create the customers.

When the import finishes, octoja shows a summary — for example "5 created, 2 skipped." — and lists any skipped rows with the reason they were skipped.

Customer fields

You can map your columns to the following fields. Only Name is required; map any others that your spreadsheet contains.

Field	Required?	Description
Name	Yes	The company or organisation name.
Reference No.	No	An external reference from your CRM or PSA tool.
Street	No	Street and house number of the address.
Postal Code	No	Postal or ZIP code.
City	No	City or town.
Country	No	Country.
First Name	No	Contact person's first name.
Last Name	No	Contact person's last name.
Email	No	Contact person's email address.
Phone	No	Contact person's phone number.
Position	No	Contact person's role or job title.

Tips and notes

Headers are matched automatically. If your column titles use common names (such as Name, Company, Reference, Street, City, Email, or Phone), octoja maps them for you. You can always adjust the mapping by hand.
Rows without a name are skipped. Any row whose Name is blank is left out of the import and appears in the skipped list.
Duplicates are skipped. A row is skipped when its name already matches a customer you can see, ignoring upper- and lower-case differences. This keeps you from creating the same customer twice.
Address and contact details are optional. octoja only stores the parts you map, so a file with just names works fine.
To export your existing customers as a spreadsheet, use Export CSV in the same Actions menu.