Search and Filter Data Like You Never Imagined Possible

Your data management practices can only be as good as your visibility. Knowing what you have in your database, where your issues lie, and what your most critical data maintenance tasks are to help your entire organization to run like a well-oiled machine.

But searching and filtering your data in most popular CRMs is needlessly difficult and limited. You lack the ability to truly drill-down into your data and understand it, which affects decision-making.

Insycle's powerful search and filtering features allow you to drill down into your data, slicing and dicing it using any field, a wide range of filtering functions and options.

For example, using Insycle, you could search for "CXOs of software companies in Washington, Oregon, and California with potential deal sizes greater than $50,000" in just a few clicks.

Summary

Insycle allows you to filter and search your data in advanced ways, easily.

First, you set your filter. You can filter your data using any field or combination of fields with unlimited parameters. You can use advanced functions like "equals or greater than," "exists," and regular expressions to drill down into your data in advanced ways. Additionally, Insycle's Advanced Search Syntax gives you unparalleled control over how you filter your data.

You can slice and dice and export your data automatically, allowing you to gain deeper visibility into your data management issues.

Searching and Filtering: The Basics

Insycle makes searching and filtering your data in advanced ways simple. Filtering your data happens in most modules within Insycle. It's how we tell Insycle what data we would like to update.

In our example, we'll be using the Grid Edit module. Let's cover how filtering data works, starting from a simple example and building to something a bit more advanced.

Make sure you have selected the first tab, Filter.

You can filter data using any field in your CRM. Here is an example of a basic filter.

state contains WA

We are filtering our contact data down to contacts located in the state of Washington. Only contacts with the term "WA" in the "Stage/Region" field will show. The contacts that meet your criteria will be shown in the Record Viewer below.

You also have control over the fields that show in the Record Viewer. You can alter the layout using the Layout tab.

Here, you can add or remove fields from the Record Viewer and in data exports.

This brings up a drag-and-drop menu that allows you to alter what fields are visible, and what order they show up in. If you intend on exporting the data, the Layout that you choose impacts the data fields included in the export.

Now let's get a little more advanced.

You can search for multiple terms, using the pipe symbol (|, located just above the "Enter" key), such as this:

"WA|OR|CA" to be read as "Washington OR Oregon OR California."

Now you are searching for contacts located in Washington, Oregon, or California.

Now let's add a second field. In the example below, we are looking for contacts that are located in Washington, Oregon, and California that do not have a phone number listed in the database.

When you add a new field, both conditions have to be met. They must be from those states, AND they must not have a phone number.

Now let's look at a more advanced example, including some engagement fields:

This template looks for contacts that:

Are located in Washington, Oregon, or California.
Do not have a phone number listed.
Work in the technology or home services industries.
Have visited the company website at least 5 times.

Insycle's advanced filtering makes it easy to drill down into very specific slices and segments of your database.

Then, you can export the data you filter.

Exporting Filtered Data, One-Time or Automatically

With your Filter set, Insycle can now export the slice of data that you have selected, based on your filter rules.

You can setup automated exports or run the export one-time immediately, by clicking the Export button.

First, you'll be asked whether you would like to export to be in a brand new file or an existing file. Choose New File.

Then, you set up the weekly export email notification. You can add recipients or add additional context to the message. The CSV export will be attached to this email whenever it is generated.

Then, on the "When" screen, you can set up your automated exports.

You can setup automated exports on an hourly, daily, weekly, or monthly schedule here.

Then, data that matches your set filter will be automatically exported and emailed to you or your team on a set schedule, improving data collaboration and giving you the opportunity to keep an eye on the most important customer data.

You can also choose to export one-time using the Run Now tab.

To fully understand Insycle's filtering and search depth, you need to be familiar with all of the different function options that are available for each field type.

Troubleshooting Searching and Filtering Issues

If you are filtering data and are finding that the results within Insycle are not what you would expect, start by answering these questions?

Does Insycle have values for the field in question. Do this by removing the filter and adding the field to the layout.
Has the field type changed lately? For example, from text field to picklist? Or from text to number?

If the answer to #1 is "No," or the answer to #2 is "Yes," then you likely have a sync lag issue.

You can trigger a fresh syncing between your app and Insycle on this page.

Modified records sync hourly, deleted or merged records sync nightly.

Search Functions By Field Type

Insycle offers a wide range of different functions that allow you to filter data. Depending on the field type, there may be different options available to you. For instance, number-based fields have different options than free-text fields.

Here is a breakdown of every major filtering function:

Free Text Field Functions

Starts with. Field begins with. ("New York" would identify records with "New York" and "New York City.")
Contains. Term is contained anywhere in the field. ("York" would surface "New York," "New York City," and "Yorkshire.")
Is. Is exactly as entered, with no additional keystrokes. ("New York" would surface "New York.)
Exists. Contains any value in the field at all.
Contains Term. Contains the entire term anywhere in the field. ("Chief" would surface "Chief Executive Officer," "Chief Financial Officer," "Fire Chief," etc.)
Ends With. Field ends with the exact entry. ("Inc." would surface all company names that end with "Inc.")
Similar. Finds all similar fields. ("Gmail.com" would surface "Gmil.com" "Gmaail.com," or "G-Mail.com," etc.)
Regex. A regular expression is a pattern that matches strings or pieces of strings. Please See the Section Below for examples.
Doesn't Start With. Finds fields that do not start with the specified term. ("Mr." would filter out first names that contain the term "Mr.")
Doesn't Contain. The field does not contain the term anywhere. ("Microsoft" to search for a list of companies, but remove Microsoft from the list.)
Is Not. Surface all fields that do not match the entered term exactly. ("State is not Washington" would surface all contains not from Washington.)
Doesn't Exist. Surface records that have no data contained in the specified field.
Doesn't Contain Term. Does not contain the term anywhere in the field.
Doesn't End With. Field does not end with. ("Inc." would surface all company names that do not end with "Inc.")
Not Similar. Find all records that do not have fields that are similar to your entered term. ("Not similar to Microsoft" to remove Microsoft and all similar company names from a list).
Negate Regex. Negate a group of characters and find fields that do not contain your regular expression search.

Numbers and Integer Field Functions

Is. Field matches input exactly.
Is not. Field contains anything except exactly what was entered.
Equals or less than. Is equal to or less than the specified number.
Equals or greater than. Is equal to or greater than the specified number.
Less than. Is less than the specified number.
Greater than. Is greater than the specified number.
Exists. The field contains any data at all.
Doesn't Exist. The field contains no data at all.
Regex. Filter records using regular expressions. See examples below.
Negate regex. Negate records through regular expressions. See examples below.

Date Field Functions

In the last. In example, "In the last 6 weeks."
Between. Between two specific dates.
Is. Field matches a specific date.
Is not. Field contains any date except specified date.
Before the last. In example, "Before the last 6 weeks."
At or before. "At or before the last 6 weeks."
At or after. "At or after 6 months ago."
Before. "Before 6 months ago."
After. "After 6 months ago."
Exists. The field contains any data at all.
Doesn't Exist. The field contains no data at all.

Additionally, date fields allow you to set dates using the calendar widget, making choosing timeframes simple.

Multi-Select and Picklists

Any of. Contains any listed selections.
Not any of. Contains none of the listed selections.
All of. Contains all of the listed selections. Can contain others as well.
Not all of. Any record that does not include all of the listed selections in the picklist field.
Exists. Contains any data at all.
Doesn't Exist. Contains no data for the picklist field.

Additionally, picklist fields allow you to select the existing values in the picklist through a dropdown.

Reference Fields (like Owner)

Any of. Contains any listed selections.
Not any of. Contains none of the listed selections.
All of. Contains all of the listed selections. Can contain others as well.
Not all of. Any record that does not include all of the listed selections in the picklist field.
Exists. Contains any data at all.
Doesn't Exist. Contains no data for the picklist field.

Additionally, reference fields include dropdowns allowing you to select specific referenced records when building filters.

Advanced Search

While Insycle's filter feature is incredibly powerful, the Advanced search tab provides even more control for filtering and searching your data. The Advances search tab is the third tab in step 1.

The Advanced tab allows you to filter data using regular expressions, also known as "regex."

Regex commands are also available in functions included in the filter tool.

If you know how to use them, they can be incredibly powerful and extend the existing functionality in Insycle.

For instance, here is the Advanced Search Syntax for the "Missing First Name OR Last Name" template:

And here is the Advanced Search Syntax for surfacing contact records that have a single letter as a first name.

advanced first and last name with just one letter

And here is the Advanced Search Syntax for the "Invalid Zipcode" Template.

If you have development or regular expressions experience, these functions and Advanced Search can provide you complete control over how you search your database, being as creative and specific as needed.

Regular Expressions

You can use regular expressions (regex) to:

Validate that a field (or a portion of that text) matches some pattern
Find fragments of some text that match some pattern in a field
Extract fragments of some text from a field

The Advanced Search Syntax works as follows:

+Field:Regex

A negate regex has a minus (-) in front of the field instead of a plus, like:

-Field:Regex

Here are some examples of how regular expressions work:

Regex	Matches any specified field that
`hello`	contains {hello}
`gray\|grey`	contains {gray, grey}
`gr(a\|e)y`	contains {gray, grey}
`gr[ae]y`	contains {gray, grey}
`b[aeiou]bble`	contains {babble, bebble, bibble, bobble, bubble}
`[b-chm-pP]at\|ot`	contains {bat, cat, hat, mat, nat, oat, pat, Pat, ot}
`colou?r`	contains {color, colour}
`rege(x(es)?\|xps?)`	contains {regex, regexes, regexp, regexps}
`go*gle`	contains {ggle, gogle, google, gooogle, goooogle, ...}
`go+gle`	contains {gogle, google, gooogle, goooogle, ...}
`g(oog)+le`	contains {google, googoogle, googoogoogle, googoogoogoogle, ...}
`z{3}`	contains {zzz}
`z{3,6}`	contains {zzz, zzzz, zzzzz, zzzzzz}
`z{3,}`	contains {zzz, zzzz, zzzzz, ...}
`[Hh]e\\`o	contains {Heo, heo}
[0-9]	contains {0,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9}
`\d{5}(-\d{4})?`	contains a United States zip code
`1\d{10}`	contains an 11-digit string starting with a 1
`[2-9]\|[12]\d\|3[0-6]`	contains an integer in the range 2..36 inclusive
`mi.....ft`	contains a nine-character (sub)string beginning with mi and ending with ft
`\d+(\.\d\d)?`	contains a positive integer or a floating point number with exactly two characters after the decimal point.
`[^w*&3@]`	contains any character other than an w, asterisk, ampersand, 3, or at-sign.
`^`john	begins with "john"
`john$`	ends with "john"
`^john$`	is exactly "john"

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