How duplicates hurt
- Consultants miss history held on the other record
- Candidates get contacted twice by different people
- Reports double-count activity and pipeline
- Data protection requests become harder to answer fully
- Search results get cluttered, so good candidates are overlooked
Where duplicates come from
Job board applications, CV parsing, imports, email plug-ins and manual entry all create duplicates. Prevention helps, but every busy CRM needs regular clean-up as well.
Merge, do not just delete
Deleting a duplicate can lose activity history, files and placements. Merging keeps the best value from each record and moves related records onto the surviving one. Choose a master record, compare fields side by side and keep the most recent or most complete value.
Set matching rules you trust
Match on combinations that are rarely shared - such as email address, mobile number, or name plus postcode - and review lower-confidence matches before merging. Start with the obvious duplicates and build confidence.
Make it a routine
A weekly or monthly clean-up keeps numbers small and manageable. Assign an owner and track how many duplicates are found and merged each time.
How Clarion helps
Clarion scores likely duplicates, lets you compare records side by side, choose the values to keep and merge safely - with history preserved.