Salesforce to Zoho CRM migration: a step-by-step checklist

1. Decide what is worth moving

Not everything in Salesforce deserves a place in Zoho. Before exporting, agree with your sales and finance leads which records matter: usually open opportunities, active accounts and contacts, recent activities and the last two or three years of closed deals. Old, unowned leads are often better archived than migrated.

2. Map Salesforce objects to Zoho modules

• Leads to Leads, Accounts to Accounts, Contacts to Contacts
• Opportunities to Deals, with stages mapped one by one
• Tasks, Events and Calls to Zoho Activities
• Products, Price Books and Quotes to their Zoho equivalents
• Custom objects to Zoho custom modules
• Record owners to Zoho users, so ownership is kept

Field mapping reference

Use this as a starting map. Your own org will have custom fields and objects to add.

3. Export and clean the data

Use the Salesforce Data Export service or Data Loader to export each object with its record ID. Keep those IDs, because they are what lets you rebuild the links between accounts, contacts and deals in Zoho.

Clean before you import: merge duplicates, fix picklist values that no longer exist, and standardise phone numbers and country names.

4. Rebuild automation instead of copying it

Salesforce Flows, Process Builder rules and Apex code do not transfer. List each automation, decide whether you still need it, and rebuild it with Zoho workflow rules, Blueprints, assignment rules or Deluge functions. This is also a good time to drop automation nobody uses.

What to rebuild, and with what

5. Import in the right order

• Users and roles first
• Accounts, then Contacts linked to Accounts
• Deals linked to Accounts and Contacts
• Activities, notes and attachments last
• Run a sample import of 50 to 100 records before the full load

6. Test, train and cut over

Ask two or three users to check their own records in Zoho against Salesforce. Train the team on the new layouts, then pick a cut-over date, freeze changes in Salesforce, run a final delta import and switch everyone over. Keep Salesforce read-only for a short period as a safety net.

Cost and timeline

A Salesforce to Zoho CRM migration with Flowpeak starts from ₹75,000 or USD 800 for a standard data set. Most projects take three to six weeks depending on data volume and the automation to rebuild.

Typical timeline

Small orgs with clean data can finish in three weeks. Orgs with many custom objects, attachments or integrations take longer.

Common migration mistakes

• Not exporting Salesforce record IDs, which breaks links between accounts, contacts and deals
• Importing activities before their parent records exist
• Mapping picklist values loosely, so reports in Zoho do not match
• Forgetting attachments and email history until after cut-over
• Switching off Salesforce before users have checked their own data
• Cancelling the Salesforce contract before the final export is safely stored

Frequently asked questions