Your synagogue's Excel file earns its retirement
That spreadsheet has run the community for six years. It did the job — but it's time. Here's how to complete your first import in under 20 minutes, and finish the rest of the migration at your own pace.
Not sure Excel is the problem? Read the honest comparison: Excel vs. Beita — and decide for yourself.
Prefer to see the file format first? Download our sample import template (CSV).
Same members — Beita just sees them
The file you open every Tuesday, full of duplicates, empty columns, and a "status" column nobody remembers the meaning of.
members-2018-FINAL-v3-real.xlsx
23 duplicates, 11 bad phone numbers, 14 rows marked "check this." Who even opens this file anymore?
Community members • 187 active
Clean, cross-referenced with donations and prayer attendance, and every congregant can update their own record through the app.
Before you import — 3 quick checks
Your spreadsheet is probably already in decent shape. A few small tweaks and it'll import cleanly.
One row = one congregant
If a single row covers an entire family, split it into husband, wife, kids. Beita treats every person as a separate record.
Headers in Hebrew or English
First name / last name / phone / date of birth / yahrzeit — Beita recognizes them either way, including plain English headers like "Name," "Tel," "DOB."
Dates in a consistent format
DD/MM/YYYY or DD.MM.YYYY both work. Got Hebrew calendar dates in there too (like 27 Adar 5747)? Beita handles those as well.
4 steps from Excel to Beita
A complete process in 20 minutes. If something gets stuck, in-app chat replies within 5 minutes.
Open an account and go to "Members"
Email invite, sign in, navigate to the "Members" page in your dashboard.
Upload the file
The "Import Excel" button accepts .xlsx, .csv, and Google Sheets. Drag, drop, done.
Map the columns
Beita guesses what each column is. Confirm or correct it — got a field like "donation track"? Map it to "activity area."
Confirm and upload
You'll see a preview of the first 5 records. Confirm — and the whole file goes in. About 30 seconds.
Common moves in the first week
Once your community is in the system, these are the moves that take it to the next level.
Invite members to download the app
An automatic message goes out with a download link. Anyone who joins sees themselves on the list — and their family's yahrzeits too.
Congregants correct their own details
Anyone who logs in sees their own record and can update it. The manual work you save is enormous.
Duplicate cleanup
Excel tends to accumulate duplicates over the years. Beita spots records that share a phone number during import and skips them automatically.
When you import an old, well-worn Excel file, Beita automatically flags duplicate records by phone number — so the migration starts from a cleaner slate than the spreadsheet ever was.
Your Excel file retires this week.
Beita is free for 30 days. Our import team makes sure everything uploads smoothly.
Book a demo →