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Migrate your contacts from a spreadsheet to a personal CRM
A spreadsheet is a fine place to start and a frustrating place to stay. Here's how to move your relationship data over cleanly, without losing the notes you've built up.
Key takeaways
De-duplicate and trim the spreadsheet
Before exporting anything, spend twenty minutes cleaning. Remove duplicate rows, merge multiple entries for the same person, delete contacts you no longer have any relationship with, and standardise date formats. The cleaner the sheet now, the less you'll fix by hand later.
Export to CSV
Save the cleaned spreadsheet as a CSV file - the universal format every tool can read. Make sure the first row holds clear column headers (Name, Email, Notes, Last contacted) so the mapping step is unambiguous. Keep a copy of the original sheet untouched as a backup.
Map columns to fields - notes first
Import the CSV and match each column to the right field. Prioritise the notes column above everything else - it's your irreplaceable asset. Confirm that every line of context lands in the notes or log field intact before worrying about phone numbers and addresses.
Set a cadence as each person lands
Go through the imported contacts and assign each a cadence - monthly, quarterly, yearly, or never. Do it now, while you're already looking at the person, rather than as a separate later pass. This is the step that turns a static list into a system that surfaces overdues on its own.
Spot-check and retire the spreadsheet
Open a handful of contacts and confirm the notes, dates, and details came across correctly. Once you're satisfied, archive the old spreadsheet rather than deleting it - keep it as a backup for a few weeks. Then commit to the new tool as the single source of truth so you don't drift into maintaining both.
Why the spreadsheet stops being enough
A spreadsheet is genuinely the right first tool. It's free, flexible, and you already know how to use it - many people run a perfectly good contacts sheet for years. The point it breaks down is always the same: the spreadsheet is static. It can hold a last-contacted date in a cell, but it can't tell you who's overdue without you sorting and scanning by hand every time. It has no concept of a cadence, no reminder, no sense of time passing. The moment you find yourself manually checking "who haven't I spoken to in a while" and giving up halfway down the rows, you've hit the spreadsheet's ceiling - and that's the right time to move.
Clean before you carry
The single biggest determinant of a smooth migration is the state of the spreadsheet before you start. Migrating a messy sheet just relocates the mess into a nicer interface. Spend twenty minutes first: delete the duplicate rows, merge the three entries that are all the same Sarah, drop the contacts you genuinely no longer have any relationship with, and standardise the obvious inconsistencies (dates in one format, a single column for the actual name). You're not aiming for perfection - just clean enough that what arrives in the new tool is the network you actually have, not a decade of accumulated cruft.
Your notes are the asset - protect them
The names and emails in your spreadsheet are replaceable; you could rebuild that part from your phone in an afternoon. What you can't rebuild is the free-text notes column - the context you've accumulated about each person over years. That's the actual asset, and it's the part a careless migration most often mangles. When you map columns, treat the notes column as the priority: make sure every line of it lands in the new tool's notes or log field intact, even if it means a little manual cleanup. Losing a phone number is an annoyance; losing the note that says "don't bring up the divorce, her daughter just started uni, allergic to nuts" is losing the reason you kept the spreadsheet at all.
Use the move to do what the sheet couldn't
Migration is the natural moment to add the one thing a spreadsheet structurally lacks: a cadence per person. As each contact lands in the new tool, decide how often you actually want to reach out - monthly, quarterly, yearly, never - and set it then, while you're already looking at the person. Doing it during the move means the system is useful the day you finish, surfacing overdues immediately, rather than being a prettier static list you still have to scan by hand. This is the payoff of leaving the spreadsheet, so don't skip it; the cadence is the whole reason you're moving.
Where the data lands matters
Moving your relationship data into a hosted tool is the right moment to ask where it will actually live. Your notes column holds some of the most sensitive material you own - health details, family situations, things shared in confidence. Before you upload it anywhere, check the three questions that matter: where is it hosted, what runs against it, and can you get it all back out. Contact Book is hosted in Germany, runs no third-party trackers, never trains on your data, and offers self-serve export and delete - so the migration is reversible and the data stays yours. A tool that can't answer those three questions plainly is one to be cautious about pouring years of notes into.
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