This article includes an overview on key GC VM data management topics.
Managing constituent data within GiveCampus Volunteer Management is key to a smooth volunteer and staff experience. This article contains a brief overview on key data management topics, and also includes quick links to more detailed information and “How-To’s” on each.
1. Data Management Notifications
All school administrators managing GC VM data refreshes should turn on “Import Run Failure Notifications” to receive information on all data-related updates and issues, such as import failures, misformatted files, and “no name” records.
To enable this notification, navigate to the Administrators tab > next to an Admin’s name under the “Import Run Failure Notification” column, click on “No” and it will toggle to “Yes” (note: even though a cursor appears when you hover over “No”, if you click, it will indeed flip over to “Yes”!).
2. Managing Your Data Imports
Data Refreshes
To ensure your volunteers and staff have the most up-to-date information on your constituents available, it is important to provide regular refreshes of your full data set. It is best practice to send a full set of data files via SFTP on a daily basis for import. GiveCampus automatically checks your ‘private’ folder of SFTP for new data files once per hour, so you may provide refreshed data sets as frequently as you’d like. GiveCampus will detect data that has been added, changed, or removed during import, and the data displayed in GC VM will update accordingly based on your GC VM configuration.
Data Set Structure
For updated data to be ingested by GiveCampus, the files must maintain a consistent format and structure that matches your GC VM configuration. To view the file structure of each file in your data set, head to Settings > Data Import Files. From here, you can download a CSV of the column headers required by your GC VM configuration.
Monitoring Imports
You can keep an eye on each of your import runs directly from within your GC VM under Imports > Received Files and Import Runs.
Received Files will list all files that you’ve sent via SFTP that have successfully been received by GiveCampus. In the case where you send a file that does not include any updated rows, the file will not be listed under Import Runs.
Import Runs will show all files that have been imported into GC VM. You can click into any given import run to view additional details on the exact files imported, the number of updates made, and any errors.
Import Failures: Failed Rows vs Failed Files
Failed Rows: During import, certain row(s) may fail to successfully process due to formatting errors. If a row fails, admins with “Import Run Failure Notifications” enabled will receive an email. Under Imports > Import Runs > you can click into an import to view exactly which rows failed to process successfully. Once you resolve the issue(s) in your next file export, the row will process successfully.
Failed Files: If GiveCampus attempts to import a file but it fails entirely due to a column header mismatch, encoding error, etc. GiveCampus will automatically disable your importer. Admins with “Import Run Failure Notifications” enabled will receive an email which will detail exactly what the issue is and what was expected by your importer configuration. To view what was expected by the configuration, you can refer to Settings > Data Import Files. Once you have fixed the files and are ready to retry the import, you can simply upload the updated files via SFTP and re-enable your automated importer using a link that will be provided in the email notification.
For additional details on managing your data imports and tips for successful data refreshes, please check out our GiveCampus University article on Data Imports here.
3. Removing Constituents
Excluding rows from your daily Constituent File sent via SFTP for import does not remove the constituents from your GC VM. However, you can remove constituents via Data Management > Remove Constituents.
This tool allows you to upload a CSV containing the constituent ID numbers of all constituents you’d like to remove. Once you upload a file, you must review the changes and approve them. Then, the constituents you uploaded will be unpaired from any volunteers they may have been assigned to and be removed entirely from GC VM!
Please note: Only school administrators with "Full" permissions can access this page.
For more information on how to remove constituents from GC VM, please click here.
4. Managing “No Name” Records
You may have constituents that were imported into GC VM without names. These records were either imported from your main Constituent File without name data available or created when the Constituent ID was sent through an additional file (e.g. gift, degree, activity, relatives, etc.), but was not included in the main Constituent File.
“No Name” records contribute towards your constituent record count in your GC VM subscription, so we recommend resolving them at your earliest convenience by either adding the name data or removing the constituents from your VMS.
Please note: Only school administrators with "Full" permissions can access this page.
For more detailed instructions on how to manage your “No Name” records, please navigate to Data Management > No Name Records and follow the guidelines. Please click here for additional information.