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Updating Prospect or Accounts to match Validation Rules

Rachael S.
Updated

Objective

Update Prospects or Accounts to match validation rules as a user in Outreach.

Applies To

  • Outreach Users

Before You Begin

  • As you make changes, ensure that field values in Prospects or Accounts match the picklist values in your connected CRM (e.g., Salesforce, Dynamics) to avoid syncing issues.
  • The steps for updating are different depending on whether you have added one or multiple picklist validation rules to Outreach and want to update Prospects/Accounts that do not match the rules.

Procedures

Updating a Single Field on a List of Prospects or Accounts

If you have added a new picklist to a single Outreach field (for example, your custom field 1 on a prospect now has a picklist validation in place), you can sort the prospects or accounts by that field and bulk update.

  1. In the search bar on the top of the Prospects or Accounts list page, search for Prospects/Accounts that do not contain the picklist value. This is marked by adding a dash in front of the search.

    For example, if looking for prospects whose custom field 1 does not have the value Apples, the search field, I’d add -custom6:”Apples” and -custom6:"" (meaning custom field 6 is not empty).

    Note: Learn how to search in Outreach here.
  2. Select the items you wish to update in the resulting list.
  3. Above the list, click Edit > More....
  4. In the Field name dropdown, find and select the field that you need to update.
  5. In the next field, enter the field name you wish to update to.
    Note: If it does not match one of your picklist values 1:1, you’ll receive a failure message.

Optionally repeat this action for each picklist value, or choose to update all values at once using the method outlined below.

Updating Multiple Fields on a List of Prospects or Accounts

If you’ve added multiple picklist validation rules to Outreach and want to update prospects that do not match the rules, follow the steps below.

  1. In the search bar on the top of the Prospects or Accounts list page, search for Prospects/Accounts that do not contain the picklist value. This is marked by adding a dash in front of the search.

    For example, if looking for prospects whose custom field 1 does not have the value Apples, the search field, I’d add -custom6:”Apples” and -custom6:"" (meaning custom field 6 is not empty).

    Note: Learn how to search in Outreach here.
  2. Select the items you wish to update in the resulting list.
  3. Above the list, click the three dots menu (...) > Export.

  4. Optionally amend the export file Name, select an Export option, then click Export. You will receive the export as a CSV filed via the selected delivery method.
  5. Open the CSV and remove all fields except:
    • the field being affected by the new picklist validation rules
    • first name
    • last name
    • email address on the prospect or account name
    • domain
    • custom ID and/or Salesforce object ID on the account
  6. Reimport the Prospects/Accounts, selecting Overwrite existing fields as the field override option to update the appropriate fields to match the picklist validation rule.

Note: With the bulk update method for clean up, the field of selected records can be updated to one value (e.g., update all to "oranges"). If you want to examine current value and update each record to separate values (e.g., some to "oranges" and some to "apples"), we suggest using the CSV method.

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