How Does Deduplication Work?

Opportunity Deduplication prevents the same website or contact from being prospected multiple times within a project or across the account.


Levels of Deduplication

Deduplication is the process of removing duplicate domain or contact entries from your prospecting results. The Deduplication toggle is located in your General Campaign Settings and operates on three levels, which you can enable independently.

  • This setting is applied when creating a campaign.
  • Deduplication can be turned off at any time if needed.

  1. Exclude CRM Partners: Avoids adding opportunities that are already listed as CRM Partners.
  2. Deduplicate Across All Projects: Avoids adding opportunities that already exist in any project in your account.
    • 💡 Tip: When managing multiple projects for different clients, it's often best to leave this filter off. The same site can be a valid target for two different clients.
  3. Deduplicate Within the Current Project: Avoids adding opportunities that already exist within the current project.

How Deduplication Works

Pitchbox deduplicates opportunities based on the exact domain, including any subdomain. It does not deduplicate based on the full URL path.

This means:

  • Different pages on the same domain → treated as the same opportunity (duplicate)
  • Different subdomains of the same website → treated as separate opportunities

Same Opportunity (Deduplicated)

These URLs all point to the same domain, so only one would be added:

  • http://domain.com/page1
  • http://domain.com/page2
  • http://domain.com/blog/article

If domain.com  already exists in the project, these additional pages will be skipped.

Separate Opportunities (All Allowed)

These URLs each use a different subdomain, so Pitchbox treats them as distinct opportunities:

  • http://domain.com
  • http://www.domain.com
  • http://blog.domain.com
  • http://whatever.domain.com

All four can exist in the same project at the same time.

This behavior also applies to contact-based opportunities within the same project.

Exceptions to Deduplication Rules

Free Hosting Platforms

Large free hosting platforms that issue user-generated subdomains are handled differently. Examples include:

  • wordpress.com
  • blogspot.com
  • tumblr.com

For these platforms, Pitchbox deduplicates based on the subdomain, because each subdomain represents a different site owner.

Example — treated as two separate opportunities:

  • http://crazyknittinglady.wordpress.com
  • http://templefootballforever.wordpress.com

Link Removal campaigns follow separate deduplication rules:

  • They only deduplicate against other Link Removal campaigns within the same project.
  • They do not deduplicate against standard link building campaigns.

Deleted Opportunities and Deduplication

Deleting an opportunity does not exclude it from future prospecting or deduplication checks.

When an opportunity is deleted:

  • It is moved to the Campaign Trashbin.
  • The deletion only signals that the opportunity wasn't a fit for that specific campaign. Blocklisting vs. Deleting Opportunities
  • The website is not permanently excluded from the project.

As a result, deleted opportunities may reappear in other campaigns within the same project. Deduplication does not treat deleted opportunities as blocked.

Preventing Opportunities From Appearing Again

If a website should never be prospected again, deleting it is not enough. Use a blocklist instead.

Project Blocklist Prevents a site from appearing again within the current project.

Global Blocklist Prevents a site from appearing across all projects in your Pitchbox account.

Best Practices

  • Delete opportunities when they're only unsuitable for a single campaign.
  • Use blocklists when a site should be permanently excluded from prospecting for the whole project.
  • Keep Project-Level Deduplication enabled to avoid duplicate outreach within a project.