Reduce First-Party Account Records in Demandbase

To stay within contract limits and keep data relevant, you can reduce the number of accounts in your Demandbase tenants by reclassifying or deleting first-party account records.

Account Source in Demandbase

In Demandbase, accounts can come from your CRM, CSV imports, or Demandbase itself. Based on their source, accounts are categorized as First-party or Net-new.

• First-party Accounts:
  • CRM Accounts: Accounts synced from your CRM (Salesforce, Microsoft Dynamics, or HubSpot) based on sync user permissions and data ingestion rules. 
  • CSV Accounts: Accounts from CSV imports.
• Net-new Accounts: Accounts created by Demandbase based on site visits, high intent signals, or qualification scores. 

Important: Accounts are matched and merged in Demandbase. When the record is merged, the source is changed based on data priority rules. See Understanding Data Match and Merge in Demandbase.

Accounts with Merged CRM and CSV Data

Some merged accounts may contain both CRM and CSV data. Even if the CRM data in a merged account is deleted, the CSV data can remain, causing the account to be reclassified from CRM to CSV. Your total account count may not decrease unless data from both sources are deleted and they are reclassified as Net-new.

When investigating overages, ensure your audit strategy addresses both CRM and CSV data.

Identify the Number of Accounts by Source 

Before reducing the number of Accounts, identify the sources driving contract limit overages to guide your audit strategy.

1. From the left navigation bar, go to Database, and create an Account List.
2. In the selector module, go to Advanced > Account Fields.
3. Select the Source selector and the desired source. For example, Source=Salesforce or Source=CSV
   
4. Click the refresh icon to see the number of accounts that meet the selector criteria.

Reclassify First-Party Accounts

Reduce the number of first-party Account records in your Demandbase tenant by reclassifying the source as Net-new. This deletes your first-party data and only keeps Demandbase data (firmographics and calculated fields).

Important: To reclassify Accounts, contact Demandbase Support. See How to Reclassify or Delete First-Party Accounts via Demandbase Support.

When an Account is reclassified as Net-new:

• It does not count towards your contract limits.
• It remains available in your tenant.
• Only Demandbase-sourced data (for example, industry, revenue, employee count, and historical activity) is retained.
• Historical analytics and reporting are preserved for ongoing performance measurement.

The following example shows the data available in Demandbase for a first-party Account, before and after its reclassification as Net-new.

Delete First-Party Accounts

Reduce the number of first-party Account records in your Demandbase tenant by deleting them. You can delete account records on your own using ingestion control (Salesforce), user permissions (Salesforce, Microsoft Dynamics, HubSpot CRM), and re-import with delete feature (CSV). 

Important:You can also delete records by contacting Demandbase Support. See How to Reclassify or Delete First-Party Accounts via Demandbase Support.

When an Account is deleted:

• It is removed from your tenant along with all associated activity and reporting history.
• It may be recreated as a Net-new account if Demandbase later detects new activity (site visits, high-intent signals, or high qualification scores).

How to Reclassify or Delete First-Party Accounts via Demandbase Support

To reclassify or delete first-party accounts to Net-new accounts via Demandbase Support, complete the following steps:

1. Create an Account List of accounts you want to reclassify or delete.
2. (Optional) If deleting accounts, in the Account List table, include the merged ID (for Account object) column.
   
3. Open a Demandbase Support ticket with the following information:
   • Subject: One-Time First-Party Data Reclassification/Deletion – Tenant Name (ID 1234)
   • Details:
     • Tenant name and ID
     • Name or URL of Account List.
     • Confirmation you approve the reclassification/deletion
     • Preferred timing

Demandbase Support Ticket Example:

Subject: One-Time CSV Account Reclassification/Deletion - <Tenant Name> (ID <1234>)

Description: Tenant Name (ID 1234) would like Support to perform a one-time reclassification/deletion of CSV data to help meet the contract level agreement.

Our contract allows up to 100k accounts but we have 150k accounts.

Please see Account List “Accounts to Reclassify/Delete”: https://web.demandbase.com/o/d/a/l/8428/s

We are providing written consent for the reclassification/deletion of the accounts found in the above list.

You may proceed with the reclassification/deletion ASAP (or on some future date listed here).

How to Delete First-Party Accounts on Your Own

You can delete first-party Accounts on your own, based on the data source type.

Delete Salesforce-Sourced Accounts

To delete accounts from Salesforce, you must prevent the data from syncing with Demandbase using the following options:

• Ingestion Control: Configure account ingestion control settings in Demandbase so only the right accounts sync from Salesforce. Once applied, unwanted accounts are removed during the next sync cycle. See Account Ingestion Control for Salesforce.
• Adjust Salesforce User Permissions: Your Salesforce admin can change which accounts are visible to the Demandbase-Salesforce sync user. Accounts no longer visible to the sync user are removed during the next sync cycle.
  Tip: You can request Demandbase Support to run the sync process sooner.
• Delete Accounts in Salesforce: If you delete accounts in your Salesforce (and they remain in the recycle bin in Salesforce), accounts are removed from Demandbase within two days. For permanent bulk deletions that skip the recycle bin, Demandbase Support can run a process to remove the records.

Delete Microsoft Dynamics-Sourced Accounts

To delete accounts from Dynamics, you must prevent the data from syncing with Demandbase using the following options:

• Adjust Dynamics User Permissions: Your Dynamics admin can change which accounts are visible to the Demandbase-Dynamics sync user. Accounts no longer visible to the sync user are removed during the next sync cycle.
  Tip: You can request Demandbase Support to run the sync process sooner.
• Delete Accounts in Dynamics: If you delete accounts in your Dynamics,  accounts are removed from Demandbase within two days.

Delete HubSpot CRM-Sourced Accounts

To delete accounts from HubSpot CRM, you must prevent the data from syncing with Demandbase using the following option:

• Adjust HubSpot User Permissions: Your HubSpot admin can change which accounts are visible to the Demandbase-HubSpot sync user. Accounts no longer visible to the sync user are removed during the next sync cycle.
  Tip: You can request Demandbase Support to run the sync process sooner.

Delete CSV-Sourced Accounts

To delete accounts from CSV imports, re-import a CSV file and delete accounts not present in the file. See Import, Update, Add, and Delete Account, Opportunity, People, and Activity Data from a CSV File.