The decision to make first
One person may inquire about several properties, while two people may share contact details, making a simple contact match insufficient for merging inquiries. Separate person matching from inquiry matching and preserve distinct property requests until the team confirms they belong together.
What the handoff should contain
Retain original source, received time, property, contact values, candidate record identifiers and the reason for any proposed merge.
Suggested wording to approve
Example wording: “The system may recognize similar contact details, but the team should still see each distinct property question and any new information provided.”
Test the difficult case
Test one prospect with two listings, two prospects sharing an email and a repeated portal inquiry about the same property. Do not overwrite a new request with an older one or collapse household members into one person solely because they use the same phone.
Worked example
Fictional example: One person asks about two different listings using the same email address. The CRM may recognize a contact, but it should retain two property inquiries. A separate test uses two people sharing a phone number; merging them automatically would erase distinct needs, so contact matching and inquiry matching require different decisions.
Review it in operation
Review incorrect merges as seriously as duplicate records and keep a way for staff to recover the original inquiry context.
Check before you launch
- Separate person matching from inquiry matching and preserve distinct property requests until the team confirms they belong together.
- Retain original source, received time, property, contact values, candidate record identifiers and the reason for any proposed merge.
- Test one prospect with two listings, two prospects sharing an email and a repeated portal inquiry about the same property.
- Review incorrect merges as seriously as duplicate records and keep a way for staff to recover the original inquiry context.
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