Hello Club allows you to import member information from a CSV file. The import process is smart enough to import not only the basic member details, but also additional information like:

All contact details
Custom fields
Groups
Current membership with start/end date
Account credit balance
Amount owing/outstanding

Read on to find out how to prepare your import file and Hello Club account to achieve the best results.

Step 1 – Cleaning up your spreadsheet

The first step is to make sure that the file you are importing is up to date and accurate. This way you'll avoid importing unnecessary or incorrect data.

Follow these guidelines to clean up your spreadsheet as needed:

Before making changes, create a backup of your spreadsheet so that you don’t lose any information by accident.
Ensure all columns have a header above them to indicate what information the column contains, for example First name, Last name, Email, Notes, etc.
Remove any columns that you don’t need to import.
Ensure that all rows are consistent and contain the expected data in each column. Sometimes information can get mixed up in different columns.
Remove any empty rows in between your data.
Ensure each row contains at least First name and Last name. All other fields are optional, but we highly recommend importing at least an Email address as well, so that you can send all your members a welcome email.
Take note of any special columns that you’d like to import which are not available as standard fields in Hello Club.

Example of a cleaned up spreadsheet with basic member details:

Step 2 – Set up custom fields

The next step is to create custom fields in Hello Club for all the information that you want to import which we don’t have standard fields for.

Go to the Settings module
Open the Custom fields card and select Members
Create as many custom fields as needed to capture all the information from your import file

You can find more details on how to set up and manage your custom fields in our dedicated help article.

An example of custom fields in your import spreadsheet:

Note: Custom fields are available on all of our paid plans.

Step 3 – Set up membership types

If you want to import membership details for each member, you must first set up all membership types that you want to use in your import.

To correctly match membership types with your import data, it is essential that the names of the memberships in the import spreadsheet match the names of the membership types in Hello Club exactly, including any suffixes.

If you are importing bundled memberships, for example a Couple or Family membership, you'll also need a column in your spreadsheet to indicate the name of the Primary member. This is only needed for the linked membership types.

Lastly, it is important to specify at least a Start date for each membership. The end date is optional, and will automatically be determined if omitted based on the term of the membership type. If you don’t specify a start date, todays date will be used as the start date of all membership subscriptions instead.

An example of membership data indicating primary member and start/end dates:

Step 4 – Set up circles

If you would like to group certain related members into circles, you can specify a unique circle name and flag to indicate which member is a circle lead. For members that don’t belong to a circle you can leave these columns blank.

Creating circles during the import is optional, and you can always create circles later once your members have been imported.

An example of membership data indicating circle names and lead flags:

Step 5 – Use the correct format for special fields

Some of the fields require specifically formatted data. Please refer to this list to help you format your data correctly.

Date fields

Multiple date formats are supported and will be auto detected.
If possible, you can use YYYY-MM-DD to avoid ambiguity.

Gender

male / female / other
M / F / O
Mr / Mrs / Ms / Miss
Or leave blank if unknown

Phone numbers

Regional prefix is required to ensure correct formatting.
Country prefix is not required.
E.g. 04 123 4567

Address

Addresses need to be split up into the following fields (all fields are optional):

Address line 1
Address line 2
Suburb
Postal code
City
State
Country

Account credit balance / Amount owing

Use positive amounts only.
Currency symbol is not required.
E.g. $205.25 or 202.25

Groups

Separate multiple group names by a comma.
Any groups that don't exist will be created.
E.g. Life members, Former committee

Archived flag

TRUE / FALSE
Yes / No
Y / N

Notes

This is a free text field with multi-line content allowed

Step 6 – Save your file as CSV

If your spreadsheet is an Excel file, you will need to save it as a CSV file first.

Instructions on how to do that vary depending on the application, but in general you should be able to either find an option to Save as and choose CSV, or an option to Export your data to a CSV file.

Step 7 – Import your members

Once you are happy with your spreadsheet data and you have set up all custom fields and membership types in Hello Club, you are ready to do your import.

Go to go to your Members in the People module and hover over the green plus button in the bottom right. Find and click on the member import button:

This will prompt a dialog where you can drag your CSV file to. Once you have selected your file, Hello Club will automatically detect your columns and try to match them to the default and custom fields that you have set up:

Use the dropdown to make any corrections if needed. You can also skip columns from being imported by selecting Skip column:

If you are importing the current membership status for each member, make sure to match the membership property and at least one of the membership dates:

If only the membership start date exists, the system will automatically calculate the expect membership end date according to the membership term, as defined under your membership types page. If no membership dates exists then the membership will start on the day of import.

Hover over the little grey question mark symbol for more information about specific formatting requirements for that field. Example data for each of the columns is also shown to help you identify all the data.

Once you're satisfied with the mapping of your columns to the Hello Club fields, click on Import to start the import process. If any errors occurred during the import, these will be displayed at the end of the process.

Step 8 – Verify your import

Once the import is complete, please review all imported member data and ensure that everything looks in order. Pay special attention to the membership subscriptions that were imported as well as any credit/debit balances to ensure they look in order.

If you encounter any issues that cannot be corrected easily, please let us know and we should be able to help.

Frequently asked questions

I have imported my members, what’s next?

After you have imported your members and everything looks in order, we recommend that you first notify your members that you are switching to a new system and then send them a welcome email, so they can set up their account and correct any missing or outdated personal details.

Is there a limit on how many members I can import?

Not at this stage, however, if you are importing large amounts of members (say 1000 members or more) we recommend that you split your import up in two or more files.

Each file should not exceed 20 MB in size.

Can I import Excel files (e.g. XLS, XLSX) directly?

We currently only allow import of CSV files (Comma Separate Values). However, you should be able to convert your Excel file to a CSV file using Excel or any other spreadsheet editor in one or two simple steps.

How can I import a single name column?

At present, we distinguish between the first and last name of a person, so the import file should have at least a first and last name for each member. If your spreadsheet only has a single name column, we recommend splitting it into first and last name columns in Excel before importing.

Help, something went wrong! Can I undo the import?

Yes, if you notice something didn’t go as expected during the import, you can undo your import for up to three days after the import. This restriction is in place to avoid accidentally removing active members.

Simply click on the link in the banner that appears on your member overview page after you’ve done an import to remove all recently imported members:

A confirmation dialog will appear asking you to confirm you action.

If you’ve done multiple imports, the banner will show your most recent import, and it will remove members for that import only. If needed you can remove multiple imports one by one.

If you need a hand removing members from an import that’s older than three days, please get in touch with us and we’ll remove the imported members for you.