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How to Add, Manage, and Impersonate Contacts in ark

This guide walks you through how to add and update contact records in ark, assign roles and permissions, manage associations with investors and funds, and impersonate contacts to preview their portal experience. You’ll also learn how to bulk upload and maintain contact data using templates.

Note: Contacts are essential for providing LPs access to the ark portal and linking them to specific funds and investors. Each contact must have a unique email address.

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What You’ll Learn

By the end of this guide, you’ll be able to:

  • Add contacts manually or via upload template

  • Assign contacts to funds, investors, and portal roles

  • Update contact details and associations

  • View the portal from a contact’s perspective using impersonation

Who Can Use This Feature

This feature is available to:

  • Basic Admin users

  • Ark Client Admin users

Step-by-Step: Adding New Contacts

1. Navigate to the Contacts Tab

Go to Contacts using the left-hand menu.

2. Add a Contact Manually

  1. Click + Add New > New Contact

  2. Fill in the required fields:

    • First Name

    • Last Name

    • Email Address

  3. Click Continue to Permissions

  4. Use + Add or Remove Investors to assign roles and permissions

  5. Click Save

After saving, the contact will be pending approval. Refer to the Going Live with a New Portal in ark guide for steps to approve and send welcome emails.

3. Add Contacts with a Template

  1. Click + Add New > Download Template

  2. In the template, fill in required fields:

    • contact_firstname, contact_lastname, contact_email, contact_contacttype (Individual or Entity)

    • investor_name, fund_name, role_name

    • For Entities: use contact_name instead of first/last name

  3. Delete the uuid column

  4. Save as .csv

  5. Click + Add New > Upload From Template and upload the file

Use one row per contact-role-fund-investor combination. For multiple roles, duplicate the row and change the role_name.

Step-by-Step: Assigning Contact Roles & Permissions

Contacts can be assigned to specific roles that control what documents, data, and features they can access. Below are examples of available roles:

Role Access Includes
Annual Meeting Documents, Contacts, Investors
Capital Call Capital Calls, Documents, Contacts, Investors, Capital Call Notices & Emails from the system
Capital Reconciliation Reports Capital Accounts, Documents, Contacts, Investors
Distributions Distributions, Documents, Contacts, Investors, View Wire Info, Distribution Notices & Emails from the system
Fundraising Contact Documents, Contacts, Investors
K1 Documents, Contacts, Investors
Legal Documents, Contacts, Investors
Primary Contact/Decision Maker Edit/add contact info, View/Edit/Add Wire Info
Quarterly Reports Capital Accounts, Documents, Contacts, Investors
Miscellaneous Documents, Contacts, Investors

Only documents tagged to the contact’s assigned roles will appear in their portal view.

Step-by-Step: Updating Contact Information

1. Export Existing Contacts

  1. In the Contacts tab, filter and select the contacts you want to update

  2. Choose Export (#) from the dropdown menu

    Contact 2

  3. A .csv file will download with current contact details and permissions

2. Update the Template

  • Set the is_update column to Y for each row

  • For Individual contact types, remove the contact_name value

  • For Entity types, use contact_name and leave first/last name blank

  • To add new roles or fund/investor associations, use additional rows

Want to keep leading zeros in phone or zip code fields? See the Tips section below.

3. Upload the Updated File

  1. Click + Add New > Upload From Template

    Contact 3

  2. Select your edited file and click Upload

4. Approve Contact Updates

After upload, a confirmation popup will appear. These updates do not trigger welcome emails for existing contacts. You can confirm changes by clicking View next to any contact in the list.

Step-by-Step: Viewing & Impersonating Contacts

Impersonate a Contact

Admins can view the portal from a contact’s perspective:

  1. Go to the Contacts tab

  2. Click Impersonate User next to the desired contact

    Impersonate 1

  3. A red bar will appear indicating impersonation is active

    Impersonate 3

  4. Click Stop Impersonating to return to the admin view

    Impersonate 2

While impersonating, you can preview the contact’s access to documents, distributions, capital calls, and more.

Tips & Best Practices

  • Unique Email Addresses: Each contact must have a unique email

  • Role Associations: Use one row per contact-role-fund-investor combination in the upload file

  • Leading Zeros:

    1. Rename the .csv file to .txt

    2. Open in Excel > File > Open > Change to “Text Files”

    3. Use the Text Import Wizard:

      • Step 1: Delimited

      • Step 2: Delimiter = Comma

      • Step 3: Format critical columns as Text

  • Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA): If MFA is enabled, leave phone fields blank so LPs can enter them during login

  • Upload History: Use this tab to review and confirm your uploads

FAQ

Q: Can I assign multiple roles to one contact?
A: Yes - use a separate row per role in your upload file.

Q: What happens if a contact is updated via upload?
A: Their details and associations will be refreshed, but they will not receive a new welcome email.

Q: Can I view what a contact sees in their portal?
A: Yes. Use the Impersonate User feature to preview their exact portal access.

Q: How do I know that my template uploaded successfully?
A: Navigate to Upload History and click Download next to the upload to review any changes that need to be made and re-upload once resolved.

Next Steps

 

If you have any questions, reach out to us at support@arkpes.com - we're here to help!