How to Dedupe Companies and Accounts

Duplicate companies are harder to find than duplicate contacts, because companies rarely share one exact value. "Acme Inc.", "ACME" and "Acme, LLC" can all be the same company, with acme.com, acme.co.uk or no website at all. In Dedupely, you match companies on their core domain and on the words in their name, ignoring legal suffixes, then merge them in bulk with Merge Rules. This works the same way for HubSpot Companies, Salesforce Accounts, Pipedrive Organizations, Close Leads and Nimble company contacts.

Your CRM's terms: in Close CRM, a Lead is a company. In Nimble CRM, companies are stored as contacts. In Pipedrive, they're Organizations, and in Salesforce, Accounts.

Why are duplicate companies so common?

• Imports without a domain. HubSpot matches imported companies on domain, so an event list without websites creates a new company for every row.
• Legal suffixes and punctuation. "Acme Inc", "Acme Inc." and "Acme Incorporated" look different to an exact match.
• Several domains. Regional sites (acme.de, acme.fr) leave one company under several websites. Domain Root matches these. A rebrand to a new name doesn't.
• Integrations and sync apps. In HubSpot, companies created through the API or a sync app skip the domain check.
• Reps creating accounts by hand, without searching first.

Which fields should you match companies on?

Use at least three fields, each with the match option that suits it:

See Match Options for every option.

How do I handle companies without a website?

Companies without a website can't match on Domain Root, because blank values never match. Build a second Duplicate Search for them:

1. Clone your main companies search.
2. Set the domain field to None.
3. Match on Company Name (Similar Words (Any Order), with your Ignored terms).
4. Add a filter so the search only shows these companies: field Website, Applies to one or more, operator is blank.
5. Add Visible Fields like Phone Number, City and Create Date, so you can compare the records before you merge.

Review this search's matches before merging, or send them to Manual Review, since names are less reliable than domains.

Is it a duplicate, or a related company?

Not every match is a duplicate. Before you merge, check whether the records are:

• Branches or regional offices (Acme UK and Acme US) that your team tracks separately.
• Parent companies and subsidiaries with the same name and domain.
• Franchises or resellers that share a brand.

If your team keeps them apart on purpose, add a field that tells them apart (like City, Country or a region field) set to Exact, or reject the match so it doesn't come back. See Rejected Matches.

Salesforce account hierarchies: a merge stops if the accounts are in the same parent–child hierarchy, so your account structure stays intact. When a parent account is merged into another account, its child accounts move to the surviving account.

What happens to contacts and deals when companies merge?

Associations (linked contacts, deals and other records) and activities move to the company that survives, except where your CRM's API doesn't allow them to be moved. Each CRM also has its own rules: HubSpot usually gives the merged company a new record ID, and Salesforce keeps the surviving record's ID and sends the others to its Recycle Bin. Check your CRM's guide before a large merge:

• HubSpot Deduplication Guide
• Salesforce Deduplication Guide
• Pipedrive Deduplication Guide
• Close CRM Deduplication Guide

What about HubSpot's association and merge limits?

HubSpot caps how many associations one record can hold, and how many times a record can be merged. Large companies with many contacts and deals can hit these caps. Set how Dedupely handles them in Safety Settings → Merge choices:

Auto Merge can't ask, so it skips matches set to Always ask. If you want Auto Merge to handle them, choose one of the other answers. See Merge Safety.

How to merge thousands of companies safely

1. Start with your strictest search (Domain Root + Company Name + Country) and test 1–2 Single Merges.
2. Check the result in your CRM and in Merge History: the surviving company, its contacts and its deals.
3. Bulk merge 1–2 pages, then check again.
4. Bulk merge the rest when the results look right.
5. Check the Excluded tab. Matches with more than 20 records are set aside by default. A very large company match usually means the search is too broad, for example a shared domain like a reseller platform.
6. Move on to your looser search (companies without a website) and review before merging.

Example setup

A B2B team with 30,000 HubSpot Companies, many from event imports without a domain.

1. Search 1 (domain): Company Domain Name: Domain Root · Name: Similar Words (Any Order), Ignored terms Inc., Inc, LLC, Ltd., GmbH, S.A. · Country: Exact.
2. Search 2 (no domain): Name: Similar Words (Any Order), same Ignored terms · Filter: Company Domain Name is blank, Applies to one or more · Visible Fields: Phone Number, City, Create Date.
3. Merge Rules: Primary Record set to Oldest Record, so the company with the longest history survives.
4. Test: 2 Single Merges from Search 1, checked in HubSpot and Merge History, then 2 bulk-merged pages.
5. Bulk merge the rest of Search 1. Review Search 2 match by match, or send unclear matches to Manual Review.
6. Automate: Auto Merge on Search 1, daily. Auto Match on Search 2.

Common mistakes

• Matching on company name alone. Two different companies can share a name. Add a domain, phone or location field.
• Forgetting free email domains. If you build company domains from contact emails, gmail.com or outlook.com will group unrelated companies. Add a filter like Domain does not contain gmail.com, outlook.com, yahoo.com. Set the term setting next to the operator to All, so a record has to avoid every domain.
• Merging branches your team tracks separately. Add a location field set to Exact, or reject those matches.
• Matching on a field that's often blank. Two blank values never match, so records with an empty City or Country drop out of that search. Use those fields only where they're filled in, or build a separate search with a filter for the blanks.
• Ignoring the Excluded tab. Very large matches usually mean a shared domain or a broad search. Fix the search before merging them.
• Skipping the test. A company merge moves every contact and deal. Test before you bulk merge.

FAQs about deduping companies and accounts

• Can I merge a company with a contact? No. Dedupely merges records within one object, like Companies with Companies.
• Do contacts and deals move to the surviving company? Yes, except where your CRM's API doesn't allow them to be moved. See your CRM's guide.
• Can I merge Salesforce accounts in the same hierarchy? No. A merge stops if the accounts are in the same parent–child hierarchy. When a parent account is merged into another account, its child accounts move to the surviving account.
• How do I match "Acme Inc." with "Acme"? Use Similar Words (Any Order) on the name and add Inc. to Ignored terms.
• Can Domain Root match acme.com and acme.co.uk? Yes. Domain Root compares the core of the domain, ignoring prefixes like www and suffixes like .com or .co.uk.
• Can I merge more than 2 or 3 companies at once? Yes. A match can include many records, and you can bulk merge thousands of matches in one action. Matches with more than 20 records are set aside in the Excluded tab by default.
• Can I undo a company merge? Yes, within 30 days for most merges, from Merge History, but not HubSpot company merges in a portal synced with Salesforce. See Undo a Merge.