⏪ Backfilling Contacts Already On A List

A new bridge only forwards people who join the source after you create it. That protects you from sweeping a whole list into a destination by surprise. Backfill is the one click way to bring across the people who were already there.

Where to find it:

A Backfill button sits on the row of every bridge whose source is one of the built in email apps. It also appears for some pack sources that can list their existing contacts. Referly is one: its affiliates who are approved, signed up, pending or have changed details, its referred customers, and customers who bought. Backfill does not appear for a bridge with No source, or for one off moments such as a refund.

Running a backfill:

1. Click Backfill on the bridge row.
2. Read the panel. It explains that every contact already on the source list is sent through the bridge to all of its destinations, right now.
3. Click Run backfill.
4. The button shows Backfilling while it works. When it finishes, a results panel lays out the numbers.
5. Click Done. The page reloads with the new counts.

Worth knowing first:

• Email apps ignore people they already have, so backfilling into one is harmless.
• Record keeping destinations such as Google Sheets add a row for every contact, so a sheet can gain repeat rows.
• People who unsubscribed from the source list are never imported. The results say how many were held back, so the totals add up.
• A fixed delay on a destination is skipped, so catch up contacts go now. A drip is kept, so they arrive at your pace.
• Anyone already waiting in a drip queue is skipped, so running Backfill twice never doubles the schedule.
• On a ResultsAiX Mailer destination, backfilled contacts arrive quietly unless you ticked Let backfilled contacts start automations.
• On a beehiiv destination, Backfill never sends beehiiv's Welcome Email.

The results panel:

• Contacts on the list.
• Sent through the bridge, or for a dripped destination, Queued to drip out and Sent right away, with roughly when the last one lands.
• Already queued, skipped, when some were waiting already.
• Skipped, no valid email.
• A note for any contacts the source held back because they cannot be mailed.
• Capped at this batch, when the list was larger than one run reads. Run it again to carry on.

How much one run covers:

One Backfill reads up to 2,000 contacts. Each contact has its own record, so a second run skips anybody already delivered and continues with the rest. For lists of tens of thousands, Migrate is the better tool.

A real example:

yoursite.com built Warm up the new Brevo account to copy its ActiveCampaign newsletter into a new Brevo account. The owner clicked Backfill. The results said 160 contacts on the list, 90 queued to drip out, and the last one due in about 45 hours. The row showed 90 queued and counted down as the drip worked.

Backfill or Migrate:

Backfill runs while you wait and is ideal for a few hundred or a couple of thousand people. Migrate works through tens or hundreds of thousands in the background. See Migrating A Really Big List.

Backfill with a record keeping destination:

If a bridge sends to both an email app and a Google Sheet, a backfill adds a sheet row for every contact on the list. That is perfect for building a first full export. If the sheet already holds those people, use a fresh tab, or clone the bridge without the sheet and backfill the clone.

Backfill for pack sources:

For Referly, Backfill reads the existing affiliates or customers that match the bridge's trigger. Somebody who was an affiliate before you connected Referly is caught up this way, without being treated as a new approval.

After a backfill:

1. Open History on the bridge to see the newest deliveries.
2. Check a few contacts in the destination app.
3. Leave the bridge enabled, so new arrivals keep flowing.

Tips:

• Test the bridge with Send live test before a backfill, so the mapping is right first.
• Put a drip on a destination before backfilling into a brand new account.