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Location Data Management

Suite

Customer Experience

Product

Qualtrics

What's on this page

About Location Data Management

In Qualtrics, you can establish a source of truth for your organization’s location data, that you can then reference in different projects and dashboards. This lets you collect comprehensive feedback on all of your locations, and analyze them accordingly. This is also especially useful if you ever need to update your list of locations; you only need to edit one source to make updates all across the program.

Qtip: Location directories are shared globally within your brand, meaning any user with access to your brand also has access to the location directories created. When a directory is created, an Imported Data Project is automatically created using the following syntax: “[Location directory] <directory name>”. These projects are only shared with the creator of the directory by default. IDPs are useful for using location data for survey customization and dashboard reports, but must be shared with the necessary users to apply to these project types. See Imported Data Projects for more information.

Qtip: To access and manage the location directory, you need the Manage Location Data permission. To create location directories, you need the Use Imported Data Projects permission.

Creating a New Location Directory

Go to the global navigation menu, then select Directories.

Directories tab within the global navigation menu

If you have Employee Experience or XM Directory you may see other directory options. Select Location Directory.

location directory within directories tab

Click Add location directory.

Enter a name for your location data.

Qtip: For more information about adding competitor information to location directories, see Competitor Reviews.

Click Save location directory.

Click Add locations.

Choose how you’d like to import location data:

Uploading Location Data from a CSV File

While adding location data, select Upload data manually from a CSV file.

Click Next.

Click the location data file link to download a template file to your computer.

clicking "location date file" to download the template

Open the file in a spreadsheet editor and add your location data. Each row should represent a specific location. Make sure you also include the additional fields required for your use case.

Spreadsheet with fields like location ID, name, city, country, and more

Attention: Leave the Location ID field blank. If you have IDs you already use for your locations, put them in the LocationExternalReference column instead.

Qtip: See required fields for location selectors and reputation management. See a full list of fields.

Save your file as a TSV or CSV with UTF-8 encoding.

In Qualtrics, click Choose file and select the spreadsheet with your location data.

clicking choose file and uploading the location file

Click Validate and upload file.

When a file is successfully validated, the file begins to automatically upload to the directory.

You’ll see a banner in the locations directory showing the upload’s progress, including whether all locations were successfully imported, or if there were issues detected in the file.

Qtip: See Troubleshooting File Upload Issues if you run into problems while uploading your file.

Uploading Location Data with an Automated Workflow

While adding location data, select Automate data upload with Workflows.

choosing the workflow option for uploading location data

Click Next.

Give your workflow a name.

naming the workflow and choosing the template

Choose the Import locations into Location Directory template.

Click Create workflow.

Click Data source (ETL extractor).

Choose and configure the ETL extractor task that will retrieve your location data. See Available Extractor Tasks for a full list of tasks.

adding a data extractor task to retrieve location data

For locations, these tasks are most commonly used:

Configure the Load data into Location Directory task. You’ll need to choose your location directory, select the extractor task as the data source, and map your location fields. See the Load Data into Location Directory Task support page for more information about using this task.

configuring the location loader task, enabling the workflow, and running it

Turn your workflow On after the tasks are fully set up.

You can trigger your workflow before its first scheduled run by clicking Run immediately.

Once you’ve created a workflow, you can manage it from the Data Sources section of the Settings tab in your location directory.

Troubleshooting File Upload Issues

If there are issues with your file and no locations can be successfully uploaded, a message will appear, and you’ll be able to try again.

If only a few locations were successfully uploaded, you’ll see a summary of how many locations were added, whereas how many locations had issues and couldn’t be added.

You can always download your directory to see which locations succeeded:

Click View locations next to a location directory.

Click the Download locations button to download a CSV file to your computer.

clicking the "download locations" button

File formatting

The location directory only supports TSV or CSV files with UTF-8 formatting. The directory does not support XLSX or any other file types.
The maximum file you can upload is 100 MB.

Qtip: For additional help with TSV and CSV file formatting, see CSV and TSV Upload Issues.

Reasons for file failure

Includes a location ID that doesn’t already exist in the directory. (If updating a location.)
Contains columns of data that aren’t supported.
Does not contain any location information other than an ID. (E.g., no location name, city, or address.)
Has a “Location Status” is set to anything other than active, inactive, or closed. You can also leave the status blank.
Has a latitude greater than or equal to 90, or lesser than or equal to -90.
Has a longitude greater than or equal to 180, or lesser than or equal to -180.

Creating a Competitor Directory

Most location directories act as a repository of your own brand or organization’s locations. However, you can create a directory with competitor locations. This can be valuable for linking specific competitors to each of your own organization’s locations, adding comparative insight to your reputation management reporting.

To learn more, see Competitive Reviews.

Editing Locations

If you want to remove locations or change how they appear in the location selector, you can return to the location directory.

Go to the global navigation menu, select Directories, then select Location Directory.

location directory selected on directory navigation page

Then, click View locations next to 1 of your location directories.

Once there, you can do the following:

Search: Find a specific location to make changes to. Note that search is only compatible with default location fields.

Add location: Add locations to the directory. Click Add location to add an individual location by filling out the provided fields. To add locations in bulk, click the arrow next to this button and select Add more locations. You can then either upload a CSV file or create an automated workflow.

Download locations: Download the CSV of your location data. You can edit this to add and remove locations. Make sure to keep all locations you want to include.

Edit: Make changes to a given location’s existing fields.

Qtip: If you are syncing your directory with an external source, like Google, Amazon, or an SFTP, edits you make here may be updated when the synchronization is refreshed.

Delete: Delete a select location from the directory.

View: Select a location and view all related field values in the righthand panel.

viewing location information in the panel to the right

Displayed address

You can decide what information you want to display with each location in the selector. You can choose 3 from any of the fields mapped to the location directory. When you’re finished, click Save.

Window where you configure address display details

Location Settings

The settings menu provides different settings that you can configure for your directory.

the settings tab in a location directory

Data Sources

The data sources tab contains a list of the data sources used in the location directory you selected. Click Add or update location data to upload a location list.

To add a new location: leave the “LocationID” field empty.
To update existing locations: edit the fields you would like to update but leave the existing “LocationID” field the same. For more information, see Uploading Locations to a Directory.
To delete a location: Add a column with the title “toBeDeleted”, then enter “yes” for the rows of locations you would like to delete. These values are case sensitive. See Deleting Locations from a Directory for more information.

Qtip: Any existing data not included in the uploaded file will remain the same.

If you’ve set up any automated workflows to import location data, they will also be listed in the data sources section. You can see which workflows are currently active and which have been turned off. Click View workflow to be brought to the workflow editor for that specific workflow.

in the settings tab, viewing location workflows

Schema Settings

The schema settings contain the location fields used in your directory. Click Create a custom location field to add a new field to the directory.

Name the custom field.

Set the custom field type.

Delete the custom field and cancel changes.

Save the custom field.

Qtip: Custom fields are shared across all location directories. You can create up to 30 custom fields per brand. Once custom fields are created, they cannot be deleted.

Displayed Address

Reporting

Only competitor directories having a Reporting section. This is where competitor and company directory locations are aggregated. For more, see Competitive Reviews.

Delete Directory

Warning: Deleting a location directory will impact any dashboards, location selectors, or reputation management projects it’s connected to. Once a location directory is deleted, it is irretrievable, and you will need to create a new directory to connect to selectors and projects.

Click View locations for the directory you’d like to delete.

In the Settings tab, go to Manage directory.

Click Delete directory.

Select I understand that all users will lose access to this directory.

Enter the name of the directory.

Click Delete directory.

Active Projects

Navigate to the Active projects tab to view the projects that currently use data from your location directory. For example, a project that uses location selector questions would be here. Click Go to project to open a specific project.

Deleting Locations from a Directory

You can delete individual locations from your directory manually. To remove multiple locations at once, you can upload a file:

Qtip: If you have an automation such as a workflow set up for your locations, we recommend also deleting the location from your automation source (such as your Google Business account). Otherwise, the location will be added back when your automation runs.

Go to the location directory by selecting Directories from the global navigation menu, then selecting Location Directory.

Click View locations next to the location directory that contains the locations you’d like to delete.

Click Download locations.

downloading the locations in the directory

Open your file and add a column named toBeDeleted.

Qtip: This column is case-sensitive.

Under this column, mark each location you’d like to delete as either “yes,” “y,” or “true.” (Without punctuation.)

In Qualtrics, click the arrow next to the Add locations button and select Add more locations.

Select your file with the deleted locations.

Qtip: Alternatively, you can delete a single location by clicking the options menu next to the location and selecting Delete.

Available Location Data Fields

Attention: We highly recommend exporting a sample file before you create a file of location data.

One of the steps to set up a location directory is to create a file of the locations you want to be able to use in Qualtrics. Below, we’ll give you a list of all of the fields we support.

Qtip: If there are additional location fields you’d like to include that aren’t covered here, you can add them as custom fields. For more information, see Schema Settings.

LocationName: Provides a recognizable name for each entry in the directory, allowing users to easily identify and manage different locations (e.g. “Qualtrics Provo”). These should be professional, branded, customer-facing names, and should ideally match what appears in Google Maps. This field is required for Search The Web projects.
LocationID: This is a unique identifier automatically assigned by the Qualtrics system. For first time imports or when adding new locations to an existing directory, make sure to include this column, but leave the values blank. This field is required for Search The Web projects.
Warning: You must leave location IDs blank to upload a new location. Upload existing location IDs to make updates to existing locations.

Qtip: Once location IDs are generated, they take the format LOC_XXXXXX.

Warning: Records with existing location IDs will have all non-null fields overwritten with the revised values in the new CSV file when uploaded, including LocationExternalReference.
LocationExternalReference: Relies on a unique identifier from your internal system of record, and is often used to identify a specific location across different datasets, directories, and projects. Make sure every row of your file has a unique value for this field. This field is required for Search The Web projects.
Qtip: A common use for this field is Store Code. In other words, if you have unique IDs you assign to each store, you can store them in LocationExernalReference.

Warning: Using an internal field that does not act as a unique identifier to populate values in the LocationExternalReference column may result in data inconsistencies.
City: The city that the location is in (e.g. “Atlanta”). This field is required for Search The Web projects.
CountryRegion: The country or region that the location is in (e.g. “United States” or “Midwest”). This field is required for Search The Web projects.
Department: The department or location type that the location is associated with (e.g. “Outlet Store”).
District: The district that the location is in. This is typically the District ID.
GoogleMapsURL: The Google Maps URL of the location. This field makes Search The Web projects more precise.
LocationEmail: The email that feedback for the location should be sent to.
LocationLatitude: The latitudinal coordinates for the location (e.g. “40.3030”). The coordinates should be in decimal degrees, within the range of -90 to 90.
Qtip: The location selector question has a “Nearby” feature that will search which of the locations you provided is closest to the survey respondent. To activate this feature, your data file must include latitude and longitude fields.
LocationLongitude: The longitudinal coordinates for the location (e.g. “111.6634”). The coordinates should be in decimal degrees, within the range of -180 to 180.
LocationPhoneNumber: The phone number used by customers to reach a specific location.
LocationStatus: Indicates whether this location is operating under usual business hours, is temporarily closed, or has been permanently closed.
Qtip: Values should only be set to active, inactive, closed, or otherwise left empty (null).
- Active: Set manually for open stores.
- Inactive: Set manually when you decide to stop pulling reviews for a specific location.
- Closed: Will be set automatically when a location is deleted from a connected Google account.
Qtip: If you use the optional field “LocationStatus,” locations with a status of “Closed” will stop loading reviews to your Search the Web project.

Warning: Failure to use the pre-defined values for this field will result in a failed data upload for the locations with this field assigned incorrectly.
PostalCode: The zip code of the location. This field is required for Search The Web projects.
StateProvince: The country or region of the location (e.g. “Utah” or “Nova Scotia”). This field is required for Search The Web projects.
StreetAddress: The street address of a physical location. Values in this field should contain a building number and street name (e.g. “333 River Park Dr”).
LastUpdateDate: For directories that have been updated at least once, this field indicates the date that a given location entry was last updated.
CreationDate: Once a directory is established, this field indicates the date that a given location entry was created.
GoogleAccountName: The name of the Google Business account used to manage the location’s Business Profile.
GoogleLocationName: The name used to represent the location on Google.
GooglePlaceID: The unique identifier populated by Google for your location. This type of identifier is created by Google to organize places such as businesses, landmarks, parks, and intersections
GoogleStoreCode: The unique identifier assigned to each location in your Google Business Profile.

Attention: For the fields required by each solution, see Required Location Data Fields for Location Selectors and Required Fields for Reputation Management.

Customizing Surveys with Supplemental Data

Using supplemental data sources (SDS) in your survey projects lets you use location data to customize the survey experience and enhance your data analysis. You’ll be able to customize what customers see based on their location, and you’ll be able to pull in a lot of location data without having to individually save each piece of information in the survey itself.

Once you set up supplemental data in the same survey as your location selector or solicit reviews question, you’ll be able to use the following features:

In addition, you will then be able to save your location data as embedded data, which can be used in results dashboards, reports, Stats iQ, and more.

Create your location directory.

Qtip: If you’re using a solicit reviews question, make sure you’ve got your your Google Place IDs so you can add them to the location directory.

Use the same data file to create a supplemental data source (SDS).

Now we need to make sure the SDS will stay updated with the same location info as the directory. First, create a scheduled workflow.

Going to workflows and making a scheduled workflow

Add an Extract data from data project task.

When you select an Imported data project, make sure to select your location directory.

Connecting to location directory imported data project

Finish the task and save changes.

Click Add a data destination.

Select Load to SDS.

Under Data Source, select the task you made in step 4.

Connecting to the extraction task and the location data SDS

Under Choose a SDS to load data to, select the SDS you made with your location data in step 2.

Finish the task and save changes.

Activate your workflow. This ensures whenever you update your location directory, your SDS will later update with the same new info on the schedule you chose.

activating the workflow by making the switch blue

Open the survey you want to connect location data to.

opening survey flow from the menu to the left when inside the survey builder

Open the Survey flow.

Add a supplemental data source and move it according to your use case:

adding supplemental data element to survey flow

For surveys with location selector questions:Move the SDS so that the source comes after the question block that asks your respondents to choose their location.
For surveys with solicit reviews questions: Move the SDS to the top of the survey flow, or at least anywhere before the block where the solicit reviews question appears.

For Database, select the SDS you created.

Under Choose Columns to Search On, choose the ID you’ll use to find specific locations:

For surveys with location selector questions: Select the Location ID column.
For surveys with solicit reviews questions: Select the Google Place ID field.
Qtip: For surveys with both question types, try the location ID. However, you’ll need to make sure you add the embedded data for google place IDs in step 19.

Now we’ll map the location directory field to the survey field:

For surveys with location selector questions: Set it equal to the answer of the location selector question.
For surveys with solicit reviews questions: Set it equal to the embedded data for Google Place ID (e.g., GooglePlaceID).
Qtip: Use the dropdown to access the piped text menu. Don’t select “Question Text.”

Click Add Embedded Data and add whatever additional location information you’d like to customize your survey with.

Example: We added the country and location name because we want to use these in branch logic and piped text.

You can now create branch logic based on the location the respondent selected.

Example: We are directing the respondent to a different set of survey questions if the selected location is in France.

Back in the survey builder, you now pipe text from the respondent’s answer to the location selector.

Example: Here, we’re thanking the respondent for visiting a particular location.

Attention: All logic and piped text should be based on the embedded data you created in step 19.

Managing Location Directories from Imported Data Projects

Attention: Directly imported location directories have several performance and functionality improvements that imported data project directories do not. We recommend directly importing your location data instead.

Qtip: If you are using an imported data project rather than uploading a file directly, it may take up to 24 hours for you to see the updated values in the location selector.

You can no longer create location directories using imported data projects. However, if you’ve made such location directories in the past and want to edit or delete them, go to the location directory, then go to the Data from Imported Data Project tab.

inside the location directory, with the imported data project tab open

Click the edit icon to adjust field mappings or the displayed addresses for location selector questions.

Formatting Imported Data Fields

In the imported data project, you must set a unique ID. This unique ID must be a text value, even if it’s actually a numeric ID.

During imported data project creation, the step where it previews your fields and you set types; there is the option to set a unique ID

If you included latitude and longitude fields, make sure they are mapped as numeric values.

Qtip: If you ever need to change the available locations, you’ll need to edit your original locations data file and re-import the updated file into this imported data project. Any new data must be re-imported. Once the data is re-imported, it may take up to 24 hours for you to see the updated values in the location selector.

Mapping Location Directory Fields

Go to the location directory by selecting Directories from the global navigation menu, then selecting Location Directory.

Go to the Data from Imported Data Project tab.

Click the pencil icon next to your directory.

pencil icon next to an imported data project directory

Map the default fields. Determine what columns in your file match the location ID and location name.

To map more fields, click Add a field.

Attention: Each field can only be mapped once.

Set the displayed address. These fields will automatically populate so that the location name is shown above the address itself, but you can change these as needed.

final configurations for location directory

Click Save.

FAQs

How do I reach the location directory?

The easiest way to reach the location directory is to go to the global navigation menu, select Directories, then select Location Directory.

We also link to the location directory in the platform when you create a location selector question and when you create a reputation management project based on searching the web.

If I edit a location's data in a location directory, will this change be applied retroactively to my dashboard data?

Yes, any changes to the location data stored in a location directory will retroactively apply whenever that data is being used (e.g., dashboards, filters, and location selector questions).

Can I use my location data in dashboard reporting?

Yes! See Using Location Data in Dashboards.

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