In Sitecore how do users that are imported in to ECM become full site users?

Question

In ECM we can import users in to Sitecore from a spreadsheet. When we do this the user accounts are based off of the /sitecore/templates/EmailCampaign/Subscriber template in the Core database. When these users are created they do not have a password. They are used in ECM for sending out emails. So people who receive those emails may click on them and come back to our site. Eventually those people may actually decide to create an account on our site. This is where I am confused. We already have a user account for them in Sitecore from the import from the spreadsheet. When they register it will create a new account for them. Is it up to me to handle that properly in code somehow? Does Sitecore have some normal way that this is handled when user accounts are imported from a spreadsheet?

What seems odd to me is that when user accounts are created from an import from a spreadsheet they are not real full fledged user accounts because they have no password. So I can't figure out what the intent is from Sitecore. Is the idea that these accounts are only really created to be used for mailings and are never meant to be accounts that would log in to the site? Is there some documentation that really explains all of this and explains the best practices around importing user accounts that eventually become full fledged accounts?

Thanks,

Corey

Answer 1

I believe the import from a spreadsheet option is specifically for new accounts. It's useful for when you have external user's from a CRM for example and you want to use them in ECM. If the users already exist then you have to assign them to a recipient list rather than import them in (This just sets a role on their user account)

You should be able to create fully fledged accounts when importing these users by changing some settings:

The Profile for the user can be changed in the settings, on the ECM Manager Root there is a field called Default Subscriber Profile. By Default this is Subscriber but you could use your own one to pass fields from the spread sheet to the Custom Profile.

The default domain can also be changed on the import wizard to whichever domain you need for your fully fledged user (Should be on the 3rd step of the import wizard).

When you have this set up to make the user able to sign in you'd have to do some sort of reset password process so that the user can be emailed and choose their password.

Answer 2

You can create those users with a special role. If they ask to login, you have the choice to let them specify a password or even better, send them an email with some activation link, where they can reset their password.