When your CRM syncs contacts to Dotdigital, the platform uses the email address as the unique identifier. Consequently, if a contact’s email address changes in your CRM, Dotdigital sees this as a new contact and creates a separate record. This can lead to duplicate contacts—one with the old email and one with the new. This article explains why this happens, how it affects your data, and how to prevent it.
Use case
Suppose a contact is created in your CRM with the email address:
alex.smyth@example.com.
Later, someone notices a typo (smyth) and updates the email in the CRM to:
alex.smith@example.com.
When the CRM syncs with Dotdigital again, the platform sees this as a new contact because the email address has changed. As a result, you now have two separate records in Dotdigital:
One with the original (incorrect) email
One with the updated (correct) email
This can lead to confusion, inaccurate reporting, and potential issues with segmentation or automation.
Why this happens
Dotdigital uses the email address as the unique identifier for contacts. If the email changes, the system doesn’t recognise the updated contact as the same person, it creates a new record. This behavior is consistent across most CRM integrations, including:
Salesforce
Microsoft Dynamics
Some platforms, like Magento/Adobe Commerce, use API v3 and may handle updates differently by matching on a different identifier. Always check your integration’s behavior.
Solution overview
To prevent duplicate contacts when an email address changes in your CRM:
Step 1. Manually update the contact in Dotdigital
Go to Audience > Contacts and select the contact you want to update
Select Data fields tab and edit the email address to match the new one in your CRM.
Select SAVE.
Step 2. Sync data with Dotdigital.
Go to your CRM and sync data with Dotdigital.
This ensures that the updated email address in Dotdigital matches the one in your CRM. When the sync runs, Dotdigital will recognize the contact and update the existing record instead of creating a new one.
Salesforce - syncs are typically triggered by linking a Salesforce campaign to a Dotdigital address book. You must ensure field mappings are correctly set up and that the sync direction is configured to allow updates from Salesforce to Dotdigital.
Learn more in Sync contacts or leads from Salesforce to Dotdigital.
Microsoft Dynamics - syncs are managed through marketing lists or entity mappings. You can configure which fields sync and how they map to Dotdigital contact records. Make sure the updated email is reflected in the mapped field before syncing.
Learn more in Sync an entity from Microsoft Dynamics to Dotdigital insight data.
Additional notes
It is not possible to resolve this issue using the CustomID feature. While CustomID can be useful for tracking or referencing contacts, it does not override the email-based uniqueness rule in integrations.
If the sync has already occurred and duplicates exist, you may need to merge or delete the outdated contact manually.
Summary
If you update the email address only in your CRM, Dotdigital will treat the contact as new and create a duplicate record.
If you update the email address in Dotdigital before the CRM sync, the existing contact will be updated correctly, and no duplicate will be created.
Using a CustomID does not prevent duplicates in this scenario, because Dotdigital integrations rely on the email address as the unique identifier.
If you’re unsure how your integration handles updates, or need help managing duplicates, contact support for guidance.
See also: