Migrate from Combit CRM to Zoho CRM

Contacts are the primary object in Combit CRM and migrate directly to Zoho Contact. Standard fields (first name, last name, phone, email, title) map 1:1. We preserve the link to the parent Address record by resolving the Combit address reference to the corresponding Zoho Contact address fields. If a Combit contact has multiple addresses, we use the primary address and store additional addresses as a custom multi-line text field for admin review.

Combit Company records map to Zoho Account. Company name, industry, phone, website, and annual revenue migrate directly. We set Account as the parent of the linked Contact records so that the Account-Contact hierarchy is satisfied at import time. Account is created before Contact import so that AccountId lookup references resolve without orphaned records.

Combit stores addresses as separate records that can link to multiple contacts—a many-to-one relationship that Zoho's single-value address fields do not natively support. We identify the primary address per contact during scoping, map it to the Contact's standard address fields, and document all secondary addresses in a custom field for manual association by the admin post-migration. Alternatively, a custom Address module can be configured in Zoho to preserve the many-to-many structure.

Combit Deals map to Zoho Deals. Stage, value, owner, expected close date, and deal name migrate directly. Combit's configurable pipeline stages map to Zoho Stage values, and we configure the Zoho pipeline stages to match Combit's stage names during the schema design phase. Custom deal properties migrate to Zoho custom fields created before migration.

Zoho CRM has no native project management module. We scope project migration during discovery: if Combit Projects function as sales milestones within a deal, they migrate as a custom field group on the Deal object. If Projects are operational records spanning multiple deals and contacts, we configure a Zoho Creator application or a custom module to preserve the project hierarchy, budget, dates, and line items. The customer chooses the approach during scoping.

Combit Activities (calls, meetings, tasks, notes) map to Zoho Tasks and Events. We preserve the activity type, date, duration, and description, and link each record to the parent Contact or Deal via Zoho's WhatId field. The parent Contact is resolved through the email dedupe key established during Contact import. Activity timestamps are preserved as ActivityDate on the Zoho record for timeline fidelity.

Combit CRM supports extensive user-defined fields across all objects. During discovery, we export the complete field definition list including data types (text, numeric, picklist, date, checkbox) and translate German field labels to English. Each custom field is created in Zoho with the equivalent field type before data import begins. Any Combit picklist values are added to Zoho picklist definitions so that value integrity is maintained at import.

Combit CRM attachments are extracted from the database as binary files (on-premise) or exported through the application's file export function. We preserve original filenames and folder structure, then upload them to Zoho CRM using the file upload endpoint and create attachment links to the parent Contact, Account, or Deal record. Maximum file size follows Zoho's 20 MB per attachment limit; files exceeding this are flagged for manual handoff.

Combit categorical tags (multi-value per record) migrate to Zoho Tags if the customer uses the native tagging feature, or to a multi-select picklist field if tags represent fixed taxonomy values. We extract all distinct tag values, create the picklist in Zoho with those values during schema setup, and map tag assignments during data import. Multi-value tags are stored as semicolon-delimited strings in picklist fields.

Combit User records map to Zoho Users by email match. We extract all distinct user emails referenced on Contact, Company, Deal, and Activity records and reconcile them against the destination Zoho User table before record import. Any Combit Owner without a matching Zoho User is held in a reconciliation queue; the customer's Zoho admin provisions missing users before migration resumes.