CRM migration

Migrate from Road Runner to Nutshell

Field-level mapping, validation, and rollback between Road Runner and Nutshell. We move data and schema; workflows are rebuilt natively in Nutshell.

Road Runner logo

Road Runner

Source

Nutshell

Destination

Nutshell logo

Compatibility

92%

11 of 12

objects map 1:1 between Road Runner and Nutshell.

Complexity

BStandard

Timeline

48–72 hours

Rollback included Accuracy guarantee Field-level validation

Overview

What this migration involves

Road Runner and Nutshell both track contacts, companies, and deals, but the data models diverge significantly on how person records, activity history, and custom fields are stored. Road Runner typically consolidates person-level data in a flat structure; Nutshell splits person records into People and Leads with separate lead-status logic. The migration carries all Road Runner contacts, companies, deals, tasks, and notes into Nutshell via the Nutshell JSON-RPC API, resolving owners by email match before writing records. Custom fields from Road Runner map to Nutshell custom fields on the appropriate entity. Workflows, sequences, and automation logic do not transfer — those must be rebuilt in Nutshell's automation tools. We surface a field-level diff from a test migration before the full run commits, and a 24–48 hour delta-pickup window captures any records modified during cutover so Nutshell reflects Road Runner's final state at go-live.

Field-level fidelity

Every standard and custom field arrives verified.

Schema-aware mapping

AI proposes the map; you confirm before any record moves.

Relationships preserved

Parent–child, lookups, and ownership stay linked.

Full activity history

Calls, emails, meetings — with original timestamps.

Attachments & notes

Documents, uploads, and inline notes move with the record.

Why teams make this switch

Two sides of the same decision

Leaving

Road Runner logo

Road Runner

What's pushing teams away

  • Not applicable — there is no platform at this URL to leave. Road Runner Sports is a retailer; visitors leave the site when they finish shopping.
  • If the catalog intended the PHP RoadRunner server, customers migrate off RoadRunner v1 to RoadRunner v2 due to breaking API changes, or migrate to alternative PHP servers (FrankenPHP, Swoole, ReactPHP) for simpler operational profiles.

Choosing

Nutshell logo

Nutshell

What's pulling them in

  • Lowest cost entry point among mid-market CRMs—Foundation plan starts at $13/user/month, making it accessible for teams validating CRM fit before committing.
  • Integrated sales automation and email sequencing on Pro plans without requiring a separate email marketing platform, per verified Capterra reviews.
  • Consistently praised for intuitive interface and fast onboarding, with case studies reporting 100% team adoption rates within initial deployment periods.
  • Strong customer support responsiveness cited across G2 reviews, with dedicated support tiers available on Enterprise plans.
  • Native integrations with WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, Instagram, and Slack reduce reliance on third-party middleware for common communication channels.

Object mapping

How Road Runner objects map to Nutshell

Each row shows how a Road Runner object lands in Nutshell, including any object-level transformations, lookup resolution, or schema-design dependencies.

Typical mapping — final map is confirmed during the sample migration step.

Road Runner

Contact

maps to

Nutshell

Person

1:1
Fully supported

Road Runner person records with email, phone, and address map directly to Nutshell Person entities. The person's name, contact details, and notes carry over intact. Company associations become the Nutshell Person's 'company' field reference. All standard address sub-fields (street, city, state, postal_code, country) transfer to the corresponding Nutshell Person address structure for complete location data continuity.

Road Runner

Contact (status = Lead)

maps to

Nutshell

Lead

1:many
Fully supported

Road Runner contacts flagged as leads or with no engaged deal map to Nutshell Leads. Nutshell's lead-status field (New, Contacted, Qualified, Dead) receives the Road Runner lead status value via a value-mapping table; unclassified records default to 'New'. The original Road Runner lead creation date is preserved as a custom datetime field for audit trail continuity.

Road Runner

Company

maps to

Nutshell

Company (Account)

1:1
Fully supported

Road Runner company records map to Nutshell Company entities. The company name, domain, industry, employee count, and revenue fields carry over directly. Parent-child company hierarchies map via Nutshell's parent_company reference when present in Road Runner. Address and phone information transfer to maintain complete organizational contact details in the target system.

Road Runner

Deal

maps to

Nutshell

Deal

1:1
Fully supported

Road Runner deals map to Nutshell Deals with deal name, amount, stage, and expected close date. Stage names translate via a value-mapping table between Road Runner stage labels and Nutshell's pipeline stage pick-list. Probability percentages are applied to each Nutshell stage based on the destination pipeline configuration to maintain accurate weighted pipeline values.

Road Runner

Pipeline

maps to

Nutshell

Pipeline

1:1
Fully supported

Road Runner pipelines map to Nutshell Pipelines. If Road Runner uses a single pipeline with named stages, that becomes one Nutshell pipeline. Multi-pipeline Road Runner setups create corresponding Nutshell pipelines — each with its own stage set and board view.

Road Runner

Task

maps to

Nutshell

Task

1:1
Fully supported

Road Runner tasks map to Nutshell Tasks with subject, due date, status, and assigned user. Completed-at timestamps carry over as Nutshell 'completed_date'. Open tasks preserve their due-date and assignee for immediate actionability. Task priority levels map via value mapping if present in Road Runner to maintain urgency classification in Nutshell.

Road Runner

Activity (Call / Email / Note)

maps to

Nutshell

Activity

1:1
Fully supported

Road Runner logged calls, emails, and notes migrate as Nutshell Activities. Each activity links to the originating Person, Company, or Deal via Nutshell's 'related' field structure using entity type and ID references. Original timestamps, user attribution, subject, and body content are all preserved for timeline continuity and deal context in the new CRM.

Road Runner

Attachment / File

maps to

Nutshell

File (Note attachment)

1:1
Fully supported

Road Runner file attachments on contacts, companies, or deals re-upload to Nutshell as file attachments on the corresponding record. File size limits from Nutshell's storage tier apply; oversized files are flagged before the migration runs with a pre-flight report identifying any attachments that exceed Nutshell's 50MB per-file limit.

Road Runner

Custom Field (entity-level)

maps to

Nutshell

Custom Field

1:1
Fully supported

Road Runner custom fields on contacts, companies, and deals create corresponding Nutshell custom fields on the matching entity type. Field type mapping applies: text maps to text, number to number, date to date, and pick-list to pick-list with options preserved exactly. Required-field constraints are flagged for admin review post-migration to ensure Nutshell required fields have values for all incoming records.

Road Runner

User / Owner

maps to

Nutshell

User

1:1
Fully supported

Road Runner user and owner records resolve by email match against Nutshell Users. Matched users receive record ownership in Nutshell based on the resolved User ID. Unmatched owners are flagged before migration — teams either invite the user to Nutshell or assign records to a fallback owner designated during the pre-migration planning phase.

Road Runner

Tag

maps to

Nutshell

Tag

1:1
Fully supported

Road Runner tags on contacts, companies, and deals migrate as Nutshell Tags with exact label preservation. Tags are entity-scoped (a tag applies to a Person, Company, or Deal independently) and preserve all tag values for filtering and segmentation in Nutshell. Multi-value tag fields in Road Runner split into individual tag entries in Nutshell for consistent filtering behavior.

Road Runner

Workflow / Automation

maps to

Nutshell

None

1:1
Fully supported

Road Runner automation rules, if any, do not have a Nutshell equivalent and cannot be imported directly. FlitStack exports workflow definitions as a structured JSON reference document for rebuilding in Nutshell's automation tools including automation rules, email sequences, and CRM goals. This export documents trigger conditions, actions, and filter logic from Road Runner for manual reconstruction.

Gotchas + challenges

What specifically takes care here

Platform-specific issues from each side, plus the pair-specific challenges that don't show up on either platform's page on its own.

Road Runner logo

Road Runner gotchas

High

No public REST API for FSM record export

High

v1-to-v2 API rewrite requires complete config migration

Medium

Per-installation KV namespace schema varies

Medium

Bulk export not supported — we read incrementally

Low

Attachment and media files are external to RoadRunner

Nutshell logo

Nutshell gotchas

High

Contact tier limits enforced on import

Medium

No bulk API endpoint requires paginated extraction

Medium

Email sequences not exportable via API

Medium

Foundation plan disables key sales features

Pair-specific challenges

  • Road Runner's UI labels (People/Companies) differ from API entity names (Contacts/Accounts)

    Road Runner's user-facing interface refers to person records as 'People' and business records as 'Companies', but the API entity types exposed in the JSON-RPC API are 'Contacts' and 'Accounts'. Migration scripts and field-mapping configs must reference the API entity names, not the UI labels. Using the UI labels as object identifiers will cause API lookup failures. FlitStack's integration layer translates between UI terminology and API types before building the migration payload.

  • Nutshell Lead status has a closed state that consumes records permanently

    Nutshell's lead-status field includes a 'Dead' state. When a Road Runner contact with lead status maps to a Nutshell Lead marked 'Dead', that record is removed from active pipeline views and cannot be re-activated without manually changing the status back to 'New' or 'Contacted'. Road Runner contacts with stale or inactive statuses should be reviewed before migration to decide whether they map to Nutshell Leads or are archived as contacts instead.

  • Nutshell's rate-limiting on find requests requires pagination strategy

    The Nutshell JSON-RPC API rate-limits find queries that return non-stub responses — requests for full record details across large record sets can trigger 429 Too Many Requests responses. FlitStack implements paginated extraction with exponential backoff on Nutshell's findLeads and getContact calls to avoid throttling during the migration window. Large datasets with 50,000+ records are chunked into batches of 100 records per request to maintain consistent throughput while staying within API rate thresholds.

  • Custom fields require admin-level creation in Nutshell before data can write

    Nutshell custom fields must be created in the application (Settings → Custom Fields) or via the API before migration data can populate them. Road Runner custom field schemas vary by account, so FlitStack generates a pre-migration custom field creation checklist referencing Nutshell's CustomField API endpoint for automated field provisioning. All target custom fields are created and validated before the migration test run so the destination schema is complete and ready for data loading.

  • Workflows and automation logic do not migrate — rebuild is required

    Road Runner automation rules (if configured) are not stored in a data structure compatible with Nutshell's automation engine, and there is no import format for workflow definitions into Nutshell's rules or goals system. FlitStack exports a structured JSON reference of Road Runner's workflow configurations including trigger conditions, actions, and filter logic so Nutshell administrators can rebuild them manually in Nutshell's Rules, Goals, and email sequence tools.

Migration approach

Six steps for a successful Road Runner to Nutshell data migration

  1. Establish API access and run data audit on Road Runner

    FlitStack connects to Road Runner's API using credentials provided during scoping. We pull a full export of Contacts, Companies, Deals, Tasks, Activities, Attachments, and custom field definitions. A comprehensive data audit report identifies duplicate records, missing required fields, orphaned owner assignments, and records with inactive status values — all issues that require team decisions before the migration plan is finalized and migration day is scheduled.

  2. Design Nutshell target schema: pipelines, stages, custom fields

    Based on the Road Runner data audit, FlitStack produces a Nutshell schema design: which Nutshell pipelines and stages will receive the data, which custom fields need creation, and how lead-status value mapping will be configured. Custom fields are created via Nutshell's Custom Fields UI or API before migration begins. The schema plan is reviewed and approved before any data is written.

  3. Resolve owners and prepare for relationship sequencing

    Road Runner owner IDs are resolved by email match against Nutshell Users. Records whose owners do not have matching Nutshell accounts are flagged — teams either invite those users to Nutshell or designate a fallback owner before migration day. Relationship sequencing is planned: Companies first, then People linked to those Companies, then Deals linked to those People and Companies, then Activities and Tasks as child records.

  4. Run test migration with field-level diff

    A representative sample — typically 200–500 records spanning all entity types and deal pipelines — migrates into a Nutshell staging environment. FlitStack generates a field-level diff report comparing source values against destination values for every mapped field. The diff is reviewed with the team to confirm lead-status routing, custom field population, and owner assignment before the full migration is scheduled.

  5. Execute full migration with delta-pickup and audit log

    The full dataset writes to Nutshell in sequenced batches. A delta-pickup window of 24–48 hours runs after the main write completes, capturing any records created or modified in Road Runner during the cutover period. FlitStack maintains a complete audit log of every record created, updated, or skipped. One-click rollback is available if reconciliation numbers do not match within the agreed tolerance threshold.

Platform deep dives

Context on both ends of the pair

Road Runner logo

Road Runner

Source

Strengths

  • Plugin-based architecture means FSM data lives in configurable storage backends, giving migration flexibility.
  • Native Temporal and Jobs support for background task queue migrations.
  • OpenTelemetry integration allows tracing data to be preserved during migration.
  • Distributed locks and health-check plugins give visibility into runtime state that helps us validate migration integrity.
  • Centrifuge websocket support enables real-time notification migration to destination platforms.

Weaknesses

  • No documented public REST API for standard CRM or FSM record types — all data lives in opaque plugin-specific storage.
  • FSM objects like Work Orders and Technicians have no native schema; they are custom KV namespaces that vary per installation.
  • No documented rate limit or bulk API — migration pacing must be negotiated per deployment.
  • RoadRunner v1-to-v2 migration has breaking changes across tuning, configuration, and API endpoints.
  • Road Runner Sports (roadrunnersports.com) usage suggests a heavily customised per-installation fork, making generic migration tooling unreliable.
Nutshell logo

Nutshell

Destination

Strengths

  • Simple, intuitive interface with minimal learning curve for sales teams new to CRM
  • Per-seat pricing is transparent and predictable, with annual billing reducing monthly cost
  • Full data export tool available for all account data including backups
  • Open JSON-RPC API allows programmatic access to all core objects
  • Native multichannel engagement (email, SMS, WhatsApp) without third-party add-ons for communication

Weaknesses

  • Reporting and analytics are considered weak, requiring manual Excel exports for detailed analysis
  • No bulk API endpoint—migration requires paginated API reads that must be rate-limited carefully
  • JSON-RPC API is less common than REST, requiring custom integration code compared to standard REST CRMs
  • Add-on costs (Forms, Nutshell IQ, Email Marketing) are per-company charges that stack on top of per-seat pricing
  • Feature restrictions on entry-level plans mean teams often need mid-tier to get basic automation

Complexity grading

How hard is this migration?

Standard CRM migration. 3 of 8 objects need a mapping; the rest are 1:1.

B

Overall complexity

Standard migration

Derived from compatibility, mapping clarity, API constraints, and data volume across Road Runner and Nutshell.

  • Object compatibility

    B

    3 of 8 objects need a mapping; the rest are 1:1.

  • Field mapping clarity

    C

    Field mapping is derived from defaults — final spec confirmed during the sample migration.

  • Timeline complexity

    B

    8-object category — typical timelines run 2–7 days end-to-end.

  • API constraints

    B

    Road Runner: Not applicable.

  • Data volume sensitivity

    B

    Road Runner doesn't expose a bulk API — REST + parallelization used for high-volume runs.

Estimator

Estimate your Road Runner to Nutshell migration cost

Rule-based pricing — no per-record fees, no manual quotes. Migrations over 2M records are scoped individually.

Step 1

What are you migrating?

Pick a category, then your source and destination platforms.

Category

FAQ

Frequently asked questions about Road Runner to Nutshell data migrations

Answers to the questions buyers ask most during Road Runner to Nutshell migration scoping. Not seeing yours? Book a call.

Can't find your answer?

Walk through your Road Runner to Nutshell migration with a real engineer — 30 minutes, free, written quote within 24 hours.

Book a free 30 minute consultation

Most Road Runner to Nutshell migrations complete in 48–72 hours for datasets under 25,000 total records. Larger datasets with extensive custom fields, multi-entity relationship chains, or more than three Nutshell pipelines extend to 5–10 days. The longest phase is typically schema planning and owner resolution before migration day. A test migration with field-level diff is run 2–3 days before the full cutover to validate mappings and catch data quality issues early.

Adjacent paths

Related migrations to explore

Ready when you are

Move from Road Runner.
Land in Nutshell, intact.

Tell us record counts and timeline. We'll come back with a written quote inside 1 business day — no commitment, no sales pitch.

Accuracy guarantee Rollback included Quote in 1 business day