Managing Duplicates

A big challenge for a lot of Sales and Marketing team previously was managing duplicates in SalesForce.  That's because, prior to Spring 15, there was no way to handle this issue until the duplicates were already in the system.  Then, at that time you could merge them!  But what if you wanted to stop duplicates from happening?  Previously you had to look at third party solutions!  However that is no longer the case.  Now SalesForce has this functionality built in!

So, how does it work? Well, it requires you to create matching rules.  You can do this under Setup>Administration Setup>Data.com Administration>Duplicate Management>Matching Rules.  Within here you can set what fields should be looked at for matches.  For example, if you were doing leads, you would likely choose First Name, Last Name and Email.

Screenshot: Matching Rules

Now, once you have setup your matching rules, you have to make your "Duplicate Rules".  You can do this under Setup>Administration Setup>Data.com Administration>Duplicate Management.>Duplicate Rules.  Within here, you are specifying when should you matching rule be checked (when records have this value in them) and what should display to the user then they try to create the duplicate.

Screenshot: Duplicate Rules

Like most SalesForce implemented features where third party solutions previously existed, it is fairly well implemented and easy to use.