In this overview we're walking through uploading contacts in bulk to use Find people you know / Discover contacts on Twitter (not a campaign audience). We'll be working with <12,000 contacts per batch because this is the limit for Gmail. There are several steps for this process which is a bit more fiddly than just uploading a CSV for advertising.
Tip: Use a virtual machine or a separate Windows user account so that your production contacts don't get mixed up along the way (when converting the CSV spreadsheet to VCF vCards).
Step 1. Export contacts as CSV from SalesPartner
In SalesPartner we've enabled the must have mobile filter so that we only export contacts who have a cellphone number. Mobile phone is the primary field used by Twitter to match profiles.
Open Contacts, Other Selections, Must have mobile, select contacts, click Tools, Export contacts.
For this task we're going to use these four contact fields:
- Greeting (first name)
- Surname
- Mobile Phone
- FullEmail
2. Import contacts into Windows
In this step we'll convert the CSV spreadsheet of contacts into vCards (Virtual Contact File/VCF). This extra process is necessary for getting the mobile numbers into Gmail because Gmail doesn't support uploading phone numbers from a CSV file.
On your virtual machine open C:\users\<username>\contacts
Click Import, CSV, open your CSV file then Map each of the four columns and click Finish.
For our example it took several hours to import the contacts.
3. Export contacts as VCF
The contact files now need to be exported into vCards / .vcf files.
Select all contacts, click Export, select vCards click Export.
Make New Folder C:\contactfolder then select it as the destination for your exported contact vCards.
4. Merge contacts into a single vCard file
Gmail only allows you to import one vCard at a time, but you can merge up to 12,000 contacts into a single VCF file using command prompt. We've created a target contact for the merged contacts named AAACOMBINED.VCF (so that it appears at the top of the list).
Run CMD as administrator. These commands will merge your VCF files into a single file.
CD\
CD contacffolder
COPY *.vcf AAACOMBINED.vcf
Note the large file size of the merged VCF file.
5. Import VCF to Gmail
Log into Gmail and open Contacts, click Import contacts.
Select the merged contacts AAACOMBINED.vcf file.
Wait a few minutes for the import to complete.
My CSV contained many empty cells and duplicate details, but at this stage I'm not sure why Gmail has rejected exactly 4,800 contacts. That seems like an oddly specific number so in future we could try importing batches of 5,000.
6. Connecting Gmail to your Twitter for discovering contacts
The next steps need to be completed on your smartphone. The Gmail account must be setup on your mobile, and the Twitter app must be installed.
Open Twitter, Profile, Settings and Privacy, Privacy and Safety, Discoverability and contacts.
Tick Sync address book contacts.
Note that the contact sync is processed gradually so that follow suggestions trickle through as you use the app.
RSS Feed
