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About Erin Duncan

CRM and Marketing Automation Strategist. Erin Duncan is 3x Salesforce certified and has 9+ years of experience as a Salesforce and Pardot Admin. Erin is the leader of the Atlanta B2B Marketers User Group, a Salesforce Marketing Champion, and a former Dreamforce, SE Dreamin, and NE Dreamin speaker.

Campaign Reporting with Einstein for Marketing Cloud Account Engagement

I have a rather embarrassing story from my pre-Einstein campaign reporting days. 

When I started out as a Salesforce admin (i.e. I got told I was the new admin and that I’d “figure it out.” It was a very small company.) I was also in charge of doing the end-of-quarter reporting on sales and campaigns. 

For attribution, I would manually review every single Closed Won campaign, try to determine the Contacts from the Opportunity notes, tasks, etc., and manually make associations. Primary Campaign Source and Contact Roles were in Salesforce at the time, but no one filled them out. 

So, I just had to go on a fact finding mission. Then I exported all the data into excel and did multi-touch attribution manually. 

In Excel. Ugh.

Sure grandma

Use Einstein to report on Marketing Cloud Account Engagement campaigns

Without the team actively and frequently using Contact Roles, reporting on Campaign Performance was no better. 

I could view who responded to a call to action (CTA) or registered for an event, but reporting on Account Engagement (Pardot) assets + Salesforce campaigns wasn’t really a capability. So, it was also a lot of manual work. 

As much as thinking about these old processes makes me cringe, I’ve heard similar stories from a lot of MCAE admins and marketers. 

Campaign reporting and attribution has come a long way since then — especially since Connected Campaigns and Campaign Influence were first introduced. Now we can easily extend these capabilities with the power of Einstein Machine Learning. 

Note: The two Einstein solutions below are only available to Advanced and Premium editions of Marketing Cloud Account Engagement (a.k.a. MCAE/Pardot). 

Campaign reporting with Einstein Campaign Insights

Einstein Campaign Insights analyzes Prospects’ engagement with your Campaign assets to spot trends and outliers. 

You’ll see two types of insights:

  1. Global Insights: These insights compare the performance of the campaign and assets to other campaigns/assets of the same type (i.e. comparing a single form’s performance to the performance of your other forms)
  2. Segment Insights: These insights shed light on which audiences engage with your campaigns and assets (i.e. Directors opened this email less than other segments).

Einstein Campaign Insights looks for engagement levels that are either higher and lower than usual. 

example

You can also select the dropdown arrow to provide feedback on the Insights and help Einstein improve. 

Einstein insights

What data do you need?

Nearly all data used in the Einstein Campaign Insights model originates from Pardot, so Connected Campaigns must be enabled. Salesforce also recommends having at least 50 Connected Campaigns.

How to enable Einstein Campaign Insights

You’ll enable Einstein Campaign Insights by going to Setup > Einstein Pardot > Einstein Campaign Insights. 

Once enabled, it will take about 24 hours for your initial insights to appear. Make sure you add the Einstein Insights component to your Lightning record page. 

Analyze campaign performance with Einstein Attribution

Einstein Attribution is Campaign Influence with the power of machine learning. This tool analyzes your campaigns to spot trends and then allocates campaign influence credit to multiple campaigns. 

Einstein Attribution has a few requirements before it can run:

  1. Connected Campaign and Campaign Influence must be set up.
  2. Your org has to be using the standard Opportunity object as well as the default “Close Date” and “Amount” fields.
  3. This tool only looks at Campaign Members with a “Responded” status. Note: This means the “Responded” checkbox needs to be selected for the individual Campaign Member Statuses.
Campaign member statuses

What data do you need?

Salesforce recommends you have at least 100 Opportunities with Contact Roles so Einstein Attribution can analyze which Campaign engagements influence Opportunities. 

Enabling Einstein Attribution

You’ll enable Einstein Attribution Insights by going to Setup > Einstein Pardot > Einstein Attribution. 

Once enabled, a new Campaign Influence Model called “Data-Driven Model” will be created. To set this as the default over what is specified within Campaign Influence, select the “Use this model as the Campaign Influence default” checkbox.

Enable Einstein Attribution

Set your Campaign Influence Time Frame

Next, set your Campaign Influence Time Frame (3 months to 2 years). This limits which campaigns are considered influential. 

For instance, you probably wouldn’t want a webinar from 5 years ago to get credit for an opportunity created today. I recommend this time frame be 2-3 times your typical sales cycle. 

If you plan on comparing the Data Driven model to the out-of-the-box Campaign Influence models (First Touch, Last Touch, and Even Distribution), make sure the “Set Campaign Influence Time Frame” setting here matches your Auto-Association “Campaign Influence Time Frame.” You can find this by going to Setup > Campaign Influence > Auto-Association Settings. If these two time frames are different, you will see a difference in the Total Attribution in your reports and dashboards. 

campaign influence and multitouch attribution

Select your Success Milestone

Finally, select your Success Milestone. This should be the Opportunity Stage that indicates an Opportunity is legitimate. 

Out-of-the-box Campaign Influence uses the Opportunity creation date as the Success Milestone, but in reality, a Salesperson may open an Opportunity before ever getting the Lead/Account involved. 

Note: Your Data Driven model and the out-of-the-box Campaign Influence models may also show a different Total Attribution number if your Milestone is an Opportunity Stage after campaign creation. 

In the example below, I’ve used my Proposal/Quote stage as the Success Milestone because this stage indicates the Lead/Account is involved and is considering making a purchase. 

data driven model

Salesforce admins have it so good these days

If I had these Einstein campaign reporting tools back when I started my journey as an admin, I would have saved so much time! 

These tools still save me time today and I love not having to worry about if my reports and attribution have the most complete information. 

Are you using Einstein Campaign Insights and Attribution in your org? Or do you have an embarrassing admin story to share? Tell us in the comments!

Original article: Campaign Reporting with Einstein for Marketing Cloud Account Engagement

©2022 The Spot. All Rights Reserved.

The post Campaign Reporting with Einstein for Marketing Cloud Account Engagement appeared first on The Spot.

By |2022-05-03T14:20:00+00:00May 3rd, 2022|Categories: Analytics & Reporting, Data Management, Pro Tips, revive|
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Identify Better Leads with Einstein + Marketing Cloud Account Engagement

I’ll admit, I’ve been neglecting looking into Einstein for Marketing Cloud Account Engagement (us admins have enough to do!). And I was somehow under the impression Einstein for MCAE came with an additional cost per tool (spoiler: they don’t). 

However, recently I dug into all the Einstein tools that work with Marketing Cloud Account Engagement (a.k.a. Pardot/MCAE) and was blown away by how far they’ve come. These tools enable marketers to do really cool things and access even cooler insights! 

This blog goes in depth into the Marketing Cloud Account Engagement (Pardot) Einstein solutions that affect Lead identification and scoring, as well as how to use them in your everyday marketing.

Note: The three Einstein solutions below are only available to Advanced and Premium Editions of MCAE. 

Predict purchase intent with Einstein Behavior Scoring

Einstein Behavior Scoring uses machine learning to predict which Prospects are ready to purchase by analyzing how they engage with your marketing efforts. 

Unlike standard MCAE Scoring, the Einstein Behavior Scoring model changes over time as it learns to more accurately score Prospects. 

If you’re using Einstein Behavior Scoring, I wouldn’t scrap your MCAE Scoring model. It’s still a great indicator of how engaged a Prospect is with your marketing efforts overall, and it also has the added benefit of Scoring Categories. 

Einstein Behavior Scoring zeros in Prospects who are specifically ready to buy, and it takes into consideration how much they’ve engaged recently. However, I recommend reviewing your MCAE Lead qualification automations to see how Einstein Behavior Score can be incorporated to send better Leads to Sales. 

Note: Einstein Behavior Scoring does not currently work with Person Accounts or Cross Business Unit implementations (where a Lead/Contact is synced to multiple Prospects in multiple MCAE Business Units. 

What data do you need to use Einstein Behavior Scoring?

Salesforce recommends at least 6 months of Prospect engagement data and at least 20 Prospects linked to Opportunities (via Contact Roles). 

This gives Einstein Behavior Scoring enough data to start analyzing which behaviors indicate a Prospect is ready to buy. An individual Prospect needs to have engagement activity within the past year in order to be scored. 

Enabling Einstein Behavior Scoring

Enable Einstein Behavior Scoring by going to Setup > Einstein MCAE > Einstein Behavior Scoring. 

Once enabled, add “Einstein Scoring” to your Lead and Contact Lightning Pages. 

To use this feature in MCAE, ensure your Salesforce Connector user is assigned either the CRM User, Sales User, or Service User permission set. 

Within MCAE, you can view the Behavior Score on the Prospect page:

You can also use this information in Automations and within Engagement Studio Programs. 

Pinpoint ideal prospects with Einstein Lead Scoring

Einstein Lead Scoring uses machine learning to analyze patterns in your Lead conversion process and prioritize Leads. So, if Einstein Behavior Score determines how much a Prospect likes you, then Einstein Lead Scoring determines how much you like the Prospect (similar to MCAE Grading). 

Every 10 days, Einstein Lead Scoring reanalyzes your Lead data to identify new trends and determine which Leads have the most in common with those that have previously converted. 

My only drawback with Einstein Lead Scoring is that it doesn’t connect with MCAE. It only gives Leads a score once they sync with Salesforce. 

However, you can use Lead Scoring as a way to prioritize all the amazing Leads you just sent over with Einstein Behavior Scoring. Talk to your sales team about what Einstein Behavior Scoring and Einstein Lead Scoring mean, where to view these measures, and how this information will help them convert better Leads faster. 

What data do you need for Einstein Lead Scoring?

To use Einstein Lead Scoring, you need at least 1,000 Leads created in the last 200 days and at least 120 of the Leads need to have been converted. 

If you don’t have enough data, Einstein Lead Scoring will use a global model until you accumulate enough converted Leads for a customized model. 

How to enable Einstein Lead Scoring

You’ll enable Einstein Behavior Scoring by going to Setup > Einstein MCAE > Einstein Lead Scoring. 

Here you can enable Lead Scoring as well as customize your settings. You may want to customize your settings if there are specific Lead types or Lead fields that you want to exclude from the model.

Once enabled, a Prospect’s Lead Score can be viewed in the same “Einstein Scoring” section mentioned above. 

Note: Lead Score is only available on Leads, but Behavior Score is on both Leads and Contacts. 

Support account-based marketing with Einstein Key Accounts Identification

Einstein Key Account Identification supports your account-based marketing efforts by analyzing which Accounts are most likely purchase ready. Einstein Key Account Identification analyzes your accounts and the opportunities associated with them to identify trends and key factors. 

Einstein Key Account Identification has two parts:

  1. Account Tier: Account tiers range from A to D (A being the most likely to convert) and are based on your Account data and the custom model Einstein builds for you. 
  2. Uplift Value: An uplift value is assigned per Account Tier and indicates the likelihood to have an opportunity opened in the next 6 months for Accounts in this tier.

Note: Einstein Key Account Identification does not currently work with Person Accounts

The Account Tier can be connected with MCAE (more details below) and be used to support your account-based marketing efforts. 

For example, say you’re holding a swanky event and your sales team needs to know which Accounts would be most advantageous to invite and which Contacts at those Accounts they should send the invites to. 

What data do you need?

Salesforce recommends having 200 Accounts with won opportunities and 200 Accounts with lost opportunities within the last 2 years. 

Enabling Einstein Key Account Identification

Enable Einstein Key Account Identification by going to Setup > Einstein MCAE (Pardot) > Einstein Key Account Identification. Once enabled, it can take up to 72 hours to analyze your data and create your initial custom model. You’ll also want to add the Einstein Key Accounts component to your Lightning record page. 

Account Tier can be pulled into MCAE (Pardot) to be used in Engagement Studio Programs, Automation Rules, and Dynamic Lists. To pull in this field, add a new custom Account field in MCAE (Pardot) and sync it with the Salesforce field “Tier.”

Einstein + Marketing Cloud = ultimate pipeline power

When used by both your sales and marketing teams, Einstein Lead Scoring, Einstein Behavior Scoring, and Einstein Key Account Identification can easily increase the quality and number of Leads to supercharge your pipeline. 

What other use cases can you think of for these three tools? Let us know in the comments!

Original article: Identify Better Leads with Einstein + Marketing Cloud Account Engagement

©2022 The Spot. All Rights Reserved.

The post Identify Better Leads with Einstein + Marketing Cloud Account Engagement appeared first on The Spot.

By |2022-04-29T19:07:35+00:00April 29th, 2022|Categories: Getting Started, revive, Scoring & Grading, Setup & Admin|
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Use “Clone with Related” to Templatize Pardot Campaigns

As a Pardot admin, I try to stay up to date on all the new features and functionality coming to the Pardot platform. Some new features are announced way in advance (looking at you Conditional Completion Actions) and other features seem to squeak by unnoticed. 

In Spring ‘21, Salesforce expanded the “Clone with Related” functionality on campaigns to include Pardot marketing assets and no one really talked about it. 

Yes, I know we have always been able to clone Pardot assets within Pardot, so the feature at face value doesn’t seem super fancy. However, when used correctly, it can allow you to streamline and templatize campaigns for your users. 

But, before we get into that, let’s talk about how this feature works. 

What can be cloned?

When cloning a Salesforce campaign, you can also clone:

  • Campaign Member Statuses
  • Landing Pages (Pardot Classic experience only)
  • Marketing Forms (Both Pardot Forms and Form Handlers)
  • Marketing Links (Custom Redirects & Files)
  • Snippet Assignments

These are the options within a Salesforce campaign:

This view will change depending on the assets that are associated with the campaign when cloned. For example, if your campaign only has a Form associated, “Clone with Related” will display:

When selected, all assets of a specific type will be cloned. If your campaign has 2 Pardot Forms and 1 Pardot Form Handler associated with it, all three assets will be cloned if “Marketing Form” is selected. You cannot pick and choose which of the 3 Forms/Form Handlers will be cloned. 

When cloned, the new asset will have the Date (YYYYMMDD) _ Time (HHMMSS) appended to the asset name. 

“Clone with Related” also has a maximum number it can clone for each asset type. The limitations for each type are outlined here. 

The limitations I ran into most are concerning the form fields, Pardot Forms are limited to 50 fields and Form Handlers are limited to 25. If a campaign has multiple Forms/Form Handlers and one is over the fields limit, none of them can be cloned. 

What isn’t cloned?

When an asset is cloned, all fields and customizations are copied except: 

  • Archive Date (available on Landing Pages)
  • Vanity URL (available on Landing Pages, Custom Redirects, and Files)
  • Bitly URL (aka Short URL, available on Landing Pages, Custom Redirects, and Files)

For Tracker Domains, the Salesforce documentation states that the cloned asset will use the Pardot account’s primary domain.

However, when testing in an org with multiple verified tracker domains I found that the cloned asset maintained the same tracker domain as the original asset, even if the original asset was using a domain that is not set as the primary.

Finally, Snippets themselves are not cloned, just their assignment. Since Snippets can be attached to multiple Campaigns the “Clone with related” action just associates the new Campaign to the existing Snippet.  

So, does this help with Multiple Pardot Business Units

[long sigh]….no. When you have multiple Pardot Business Units (PBUs) you need to employ Campaign Record Types and specify which Record Type syncs to which PBU. Campaign Record Types and PBUs have a one to one relationship. 

The “Clone with Related” functionality will create a campaign of the same record type, it does not allow you to change the clone’s Campaign Record Type before creating the clone. But, maybe this is laying the groundwork for this functionality in the future (Please!)?

Well, then why is this a big deal?

This functionality can be used to templatize your campaigns. 

For instance, if for every webinar users need to: 

  1. Set up a Salesforce Campaign
  2. Create a registration Form
  3. Create a registration Landing Page
  4. Put the form on said Landing Page
  5. Create a Custom Redirect

How the feature templatizes your campaigns

Users could create a new Salesforce campaign, find the form template (or an up-to-date form if there is no template), copy it, find the landing page template, copy it, edit the Landing Page to include the correct form…so on and so forth. 

However, each user is going to tackle the process differently and the more steps a user has to take, the more steps that have the potential to be skipped or done incorrectly. With the “Clone with Related” functionality you could instead create a Campaign called something like “Template_Marketing_Webinar” and make templates of all those standard assets you need for each webinar. 

You can configure the assets just as you like, with custom fields, specific completion actions, fancy design aspects, and the works. Then when a marketer needs to set up a new webinar all they really need to do is click “Clone with Related,” name their new campaign, configure their vanity domains, bitlys, and archive dates and viola, DONE!

Not groundbreaking, but helpful nonetheless 

This feature likely snuck by many Pardot admin’s noses because, at face value, it’s not entirely groundbreaking. However, used the right way this is one of those great additions that can make your life as a Pardot admin or marketer so much easier. 

What other uses do you have for “Clone with Related”? Let us know in the comments!

The post Use “Clone with Related” to Templatize Pardot Campaigns appeared first on The Spot for Pardot.

By |2022-03-25T20:06:00+00:00March 25th, 2022|Categories: Data Management, Marketing Automations, Pro Tips, revive, Strategy|
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New Pardot Feature: Custom Components for Email Content

The Pardot Winter’ 22 release includes a new way to add content to emails you create using the email content builder in Pardot Lightning. Custom components allow marketers to easily build a library of standardized components users can drag-and-drop into email content builder emails without needing to edit HTML or CSS. 

With this new feature, you can create components for standard areas of emails, such as footers or headers. Or, use it for more complex items, such as displaying upcoming events or gathering prospect feedback. 

You can create your own custom components, or search for components built by third parties in the Salesforce AppExchange. 

Pardot email custom components available now

pardot email content builder

Salesforce Labs already has three custom components available:

  1. Embedded Feedback within Pardot Emails

Add a feedback form component to emails and gather instant feedback from prospects.

  1. Video for Email

Easily embed video thumbnails.

  1. Newsletter Lightning Email Template with Google API 

Create newsletter emails with components for Youtube Webinar and Google Calendar.

Once installed, the component will appear in the email content builder in Pardot Lightning under Custom. 

Note: You must be a Salesforce administrator or your Salesforce user must have the Download AppExchange Packages permission to install a custom component from the Salesforce AppExchange. 

Configure the custom component

Once you drag and drop a custom component into a Pardot email, you can use the right-hand side to configure the component. 

pardot custom component example

This new feature is available in the Lightning Email Builder for Email Content and Email Templates (Custom Components for Email Templates is part of the Spring ‘22 release). This feature is available for Growth, Plus, Advanced, and Premium Pardot editions.

Custom component availability

It is not yet available in the email template builder, but that should be coming in future releases. This feature is available for Growth, Plus, Advanced, and Premium Pardot editions.

Updating Pardot email content custom components

If a custom component is applied to email content and then that component is updated, the email content will not automatically reflect the changes. To update the email content, you must click Edit in Builder and re-apply the custom component. 

Considerations for multiple Pardot Business Units

If you have multiple Pardot Business Units, be mindful of creating custom components that reference fields, content, or assets that only exist in one business unit. Custom components are a platform asset and are not tied or restricted to a specific business unit. 

Share your experiences

How are you planning on using this new feature in your org? Tell us in the comments!

The post New Pardot Feature: Custom Components for Email Content appeared first on The Spot for Pardot.

By |2021-12-10T17:53:35+00:00December 10th, 2021|Categories: Emails & Forms, New Features, Release Notes, revive|
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How to be Successful with the Pardot Drag-and-Drop Landing Page Builder

In the Salesforce Winter ’22 release, Pardot launched the new drag-and-drop Landing Page builder, which allows users to create nativey responsive landing pages and control when pages are published and/or removed. This builder uses the same integration as the drag-and-drop email content builder, so if you are already using that feature there is nothing new to set up!

This post will cover a few things you can do to ensure your users are successful with this new builder. For a great demo of this new feature, check out the Pardot Release Readiness Winter ’22 Webinar (The landing page builder demo starts around the 14-minute mark).

Requirements and System Usage

Before you get started with the landing page builder, you’ll need to ensure:

You’ll also want to take a look at your landing page usage and limit. Landing pages published with the new drag-and-drop experience plus landing pages published with the classic experience will both count toward your account’s limit. 

To check your usage and limit, navigate to Pardot Settings > Usage and Limits

pardot landing page builder

Ensure consistent use of naming conventions

Good naming conventions are going to be especially helpful when using this new builder. Naming conventions will allow users to quickly and easily locate the correct campaign, images, and form while building a new landing page. 

If you are using multiple Pardot Business Units (PBU) it will be even more important to have good naming conventions. When you create a new landing page, you will need to associate it with a connected campaign. The campaign you select determines which PBU the landing page belongs to as well as which forms can be used on this landing page (the landing page can only use Pardot forms that exist in the same PBU as the page). To make sure your users can determine which PBU a campaign or asset belongs to at a glance, I highly recommend adding your PBU name to the naming convention. 

To ensure naming conventions are used correctly on Salesforce Campaigns, check out our previous blog post on how to automate Salesforce Campaign Naming Conventions.

Vanity URLs

You’ll also want to make sure you have a good policy around using vanity URLs and ensure your users know how to check if a vanity URL is already in use before attempting to publish their new landing page. Vanity URLs are not validated until the landing page is published, meaning a team may center their marketing materials around the URL being www.sercante.com/really-cool-awesome-stuff only to find out upon publishing that this URL is already in use for another marketing initiative. More considerations for vanity URLs can be found here. 

Salesforce Navigation and Page Layout Edits

Make sure your users know where to find this new feature by adding the Landing Page tab to the Pardot Lightning App navigation.

  1. Navigate to Setup >  App Manager
  2. Locate the Pardot app (ensure the App Type says “Lightning”)
lightning experience app manager
  1. Select the dropdown arrow and click Edit
  2. Select Navigation Items
  3. Move Landing Pages over to the Selected Items pane, click Save
navigation items - landing pages

Also edit your Landing Page layouts to include the new Publication Details section:

example landing page

You can edit this page layout by navigating to Setup > Object Manager > Landing Page > Page Layouts

Create New Landing Page List Views

With more granular control over when Pardot Landing Pages are published and unpublished, as well as additional tracking of changes, creating a few list views will help you easily audit your pages. 

You can create new landing page list views by navigating to Landing Pages, clicking the Action wheel, and then New.

all landing pages

Configure a “Published Landing Page” view to keep an eye on metrics

  • This view is filtered to only show “Status equals Published”
published landing pages

Configure a “In Progress Landing Pages” view to monitor which pages are unpublished but in progress:

in progress landing pages
  • The “Content Last Saved” fields are updated anytime the landing page name, campaign, content, search engine indexing, and/or vanity URL are changed. Publishing and unpublishing a landing page does not update these fields.
  • This view is filtered to only show “Status equals Draft”

Finally, configure a list view of landing pages that have a status of “Published (Changes Pending).” Unlike the classic landing page builder, new and updated pages will need to be pushed to “published” when they are complete. Landing pages will not auto-publish upon saving. This new change in functionality may cause some users to leave their page in the “Published (Changes Pending)” state and a list view can help you keep on eye out for these. 

For this list view, clone your “In Progress Landing Pages” view but change the filter to only show “Status equals Published (Changes Pending)”

published pending landing pages

Automate Reminders to Publish

Since users will need to publish landing pages when changes are made, you can set up a flow to remind landing page owners that their pages are not published. I set this up with a flow. My flow looks for landing pages with a status of “Published (Changes Pending)” and a Content Last Saved date of three days ago or less. My Flow will send an email reminder to the user who last updated the landing page for up to three days after their edits were made (unless the page is published). 

automate reminders to publish landing pages

What excites you about the new Pardot Landing Page builder? Tell us in the comments!

The post How to be Successful with the Pardot Drag-and-Drop Landing Page Builder appeared first on The Spot For Pardot.

By |2021-10-22T11:01:21+00:00October 22nd, 2021|Categories: Content Marketing, Design, Release Notes, Salesforce|
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Preserving Prospect Email Preferences After the New Pardot Mailability Upgrade

The Salesforce Winter ‘22 release made the Pardot Prospect Mailability upgrade permanent for all orgs. And it also introduced four new user abilities that allow for more control over which Pardot user roles can edit the new Prospect Mailability fields.

New Fields

  1. Update Opted Out Field
    • Allows the user to edit the “Opted Out” field from the Prospect Overview page
    • Replaces “Toggle Opt-In Status” 
  2. Update Do Not Email Field
    • Allows the user to edit the “Do Not Email” field from the Prospect Overview page
  3. Reset soft bounce count
    • Allows the user to reset the soft bounce count for a prospect. When soft bounces are detected, a “reset” option will appear.
  4. Reset hard bounce count
    • Allows the user to reset a hard bounce for a prospect. 

“Update Opted Out Field” will be enabled for the Pardot Administrator role by default. The other three abilities will be enabled for the Administrator role and the Marketing role by default. Users will only be able to manually toggle these abilities on and off within a Custom User Role. 

When should you reset soft and hard bounces?

You should reset a prospect’s soft or hard bounce if the bounce(s) only resulted from a system issue, such as:

  1. The mailbox is temporarily unavailable or busy
  2. The mailbox is full
  3. An issue similar to when Barracuda incorrectly blocked vendor IPs including Pardot 

If the bounce(s) resulted from the email address not existing, the email or sender being blocked, or due to a bad sending reputation, you should not reset the bounce(s). Continuing to email prospects who have received a hard bounce for these reasons can have a severe impact on your send reputation! You can learn more about bounce codes and meanings here. 

What to watch out for

Removing a user role’s permission to “Update Do Not Email Field” and/or “Update Opted Out Field” only removes the ability to update these fields on the Prospect Overview page. Users will still be able to edit these fields via Automation Rules, Completion Actions, and Engagement Studio Programs. Due to this, I would highly recommend you read the “Ensure these new features are used correctly” section of our first Mailability Upgrade post as well as Lindsey Mark’s post about how to align your data after the upgrade.

What questions do you have about the new Mailability Upgrade? Tell us in the comments!

The post Preserving Prospect Email Preferences After the New Pardot Mailability Upgrade appeared first on The Spot For Pardot.

By |2021-10-20T18:40:08+00:00October 20th, 2021|Categories: Compliance, Content Marketing, Email Marketing, Pardot Business Units, Release Notes, Salesforce|
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Pardot External Activity: What it is and how to use it

Pardot is delivering a whole new way to leverage your prospect data in the Salesforce Winter ‘22 release. Similar to webhooks, the new Pardot External Activities feature allows users to receive data from third-party systems and use the data in automations and Engagement Studio Programs. For instance, you could record when a prospect registers for a webinar, completes a survey, or watches a video, and then trigger automations from those actions.

Pardot external activities

There are 3 main steps we will be guiding you through in this post. 

  1. Register the Pardot External Activity types in Salesforce
  2. Integrate third-party systems with Pardot External Activity (we use the API here)
  3. Leverage the new External Activities inside Pardot

To use External Activities, you must have a Plus, Advanced, or Premium Pardot Account and be using the Pardot Lightning App (remember, the Pardot Classic app is being retired).

Register the External Activity types in Salesforce

Similar to how a Salesforce Custom Object needs to be defined before you can start creating records, we need to set up an Extension and the Extension’s Types before we can record External Activity on Prospect records. A Salesforce Administrator or a Marketing Setup Administrator will need to perform these steps. 

  1. Create a Marketing App Extension.
    1. Navigate to Setup > Marketing App Extensions.
    2. Select “New.”
marketing app extensions
  1. Name your new Extension.
  2. Select “Active in Automations.” This is what allows the extension to show up within Pardot.
  3. Select “Save.”
new marketing app extension
  1. Create an associated Activity.
    1. Select the “Related” tab.
    2. Select “New” next to Activity Types.
      • This will be an action your prospects perform, such as registering, attending, or being absent from a webinar.
      • Activity types cannot be shared across extensions, so make sure you create these activities for each extension!
      • Choose activity type names that make sense to your users.
new activity type
  1. Select “Active in Automations.”
  2. Select “Save.”
  3. Assign the extension to your Pardot Business Unit(s). 

You’ll need to perform this step even if you only have one Business Unit. Extensions can be assigned to multiple Business Units. 

  1. Within the Related tab, select “New” next to Business unit Assignments.
  2. Select the first Business Unit.
  3. Select “Save.”
  4. Repeat if you’re using multiple Business Units.
new business unit assignment

Before you build/set up this external activity, check to make sure the solution you are looking to integrate doesn’t have an existing solution built. They may handle this whole side of the process for you, or you may only need to assign the extension to your Pardot Business Unit(s).

Integrate third-party systems with Pardot External Activity

This step is where we’ll connect the third-party system that is collecting the prospect’s activities and extension we built above. This step will use the Pardot API and should be included in any vendor’s solution that supports External Activity. Given this is a brand new feature, odds are External Activity is not yet supported by existing integrations.

If it is not included, you should be able to glue things together yourself. Below are three guides that will help: 

Leveraging the new External Activities inside Pardot

Now that you’ve created an External Activity and have a solution to send the prospect’s activities to Pardot, “Prospect External Activity” will be available within Automations:

rules prospect external activity

And “External Activity” will be an available Trigger in Engagement Studio:

trigger external activity

The value for the External Activity refers to the individual event, webinar, etc. These values will change for each activity and will NOT be pre-populated, so you’ll want to ensure your users know the exact values to look for when using the External Activities in Pardot. You can use the semicolon operator for a list of values.

rule match all

Keep in mind

External Activities do not update the prospect’s last activity time stamp. That means external activities will not trigger a sync between SFDC and Pardot, and they should not be used to indicate the last time the prospect took an action.

rules match all

Finally, Automations will process External Activity data even if the external activity is inactive within Salesforce. So, if you deactivate an extension, you’ll want to review the Automations and Engagement Studio Programs that are using the External Activity. Consider using tags on your Pardot Automations to help you easily find and administer them.

Requirements

  • Plus, Advanced, or Premium editions of Pardot
  • Requires the Pardot Lightning App
  • Work with your Salesforce Admin or Marketing Setup Admin to configure this. 

External Activity helps Pardot customers send information to Pardot from external systems. While many things are possible with the Pardot API, this feature does not send information from Pardot to other systems. If this is a critical capability for your org, you can help impact the Pardot Roadmap by sharing your Product and feature ideas on the  Salesforce Idea Exchange. 

Want to keep learning about External Activity? Check out these two additional blog posts:

The post Pardot External Activity: What it is and how to use it appeared first on The Spot For Pardot.

By |2021-10-15T17:38:10+00:00October 15th, 2021|Categories: Campaigns, Data Management, Email Marketing, Integration, Pardot Business Units, Salesforce|
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How To Automate Salesforce Campaign Naming Conventions

Campaign naming conventions are a must have. They keep your campaigns organized, improve reporting, and provide key information about the campaign at a glance. However, campaign naming conventions can only be helpful if they are used — and used consistently. 

Enforcing naming conventions is tricky because it typically relies on the users to remember the order, abbreviations, variations by type etc. Without good governance, your campaigns will end up having disparities.

Here’s an example of possible disparities: 

Instead of continuing to rely on your users remembering your naming conventions, we can automate this process with APEX.

But First

Before you start automating your campaign names, ensure the data that goes into your naming conventions is on the campaign object. For instance, my naming convention is YYYY_MM_Campaign Type_Description/Name, so I’ll need to make sure the following fields are required:

  1. Start Date 

Year and Month will be pulled from this field

  1. Campaign Type 

Create a picklist field on the campaign object for your different campaign types such as webinar, email, trade show, etc.

  1. Short Name 

Create a text field on the campaign object for the user specified description/name. The user will only enter data into the “Short Name” field, the default field “Campaign Name” will be completed by our APEX trigger.

You’ll need to do a quick calculation to see how long your new Campaign “Short Name” field can be. The default “Campaign Name” field can only be 80 characters, so you’ll need to calculate:

calculating character count for naming convention

X=58

The Campaign “Short Name” field can be up to 58 characters.

To ensure this is clear to your users, add Help Text to both the “Short Name” and “Campaign Name” fields.

new campaign

Automating the Salesforce Campaign Name

Next, we’ve created a little Salesforce DX project that you can take a look at to see an example of how this can be done: https://github.com/sercante-llc/campaign-name-enforcer. 

The project includes the Custom Field, Trigger code and the APEX Test code as well.

The CampaignNameTrigger is how we can enforce the Name of the Campaign. In this code, we see that we are using the date format “YYYY_MM_” to get us started, which will write out the 4 digit year and 2 digit month. Other formats are available.

trigger CampaignNameTrigger on Campaign (before insert, before update) {
    if(Trigger.isBefore && Trigger.isInsert) {
        //we will set the Name of the Campaign based on other fields,
        //overwriting whatever was placed there before
        for(Campaign campaign : Trigger.new) {
            campaign.Name = 
                Datetime.newInstanceGmt(campaign.StartDate, 
                    Time.newInstance(0,0,0,0)).formatGmt('YYYY_MM_')
                + campaign.Type + '_' + campaign.Short_Name__c;
            if(campaign.Name.length() > 80) //make sure length is good
                //if it isn't, trim it down to size
                campaign.Name = campaign.Name.substring(0, 80); 
        }
    }
    else if(Trigger.isBefore && Trigger.isUpdate) {
        for(Campaign campaign : Trigger.new) {
            Campaign oldCampaign = Trigger.oldMap.get(campaign.Id);
            //first lets see if anyone else tried changing the name
            if(campaign.Name != oldCampaign.Name) {
                //we want to prevent that
                campaign.addError('You can\'t change the Name directly.');
                continue;
            }
            //ok, we are safe to set the correct value now
            campaign.Name = 
            Datetime.newInstanceGmt(campaign.StartDate, 
                Time.newInstance(0,0,0,0)).formatGmt('YYYY_MM_')
            + campaign.Type + '_' + campaign.Short_Name__c;
            if(campaign.Name.length() > 80) //make sure length is good
                //if it isn't, trim it down to size
                campaign.Name = campaign.Name.substring(0, 80); 
        }
    }
}

This trigger will also trim the final campaign name down to 80 characters, if needed. 

Once implemented, the above APEX Trigger will fire whenever a Campaign is created and/or edited. 

final view

This is a subtle reminder that this year’s ParDreamin virtual conference starts on October 27th! Register here.

Want to automate your campaigns even further? Check out how you can auto-generate and enforce campaign member statuses by campaign type.

Thanks to Adam Erstelle for contributing to this post.

The post How To Automate Salesforce Campaign Naming Conventions appeared first on The Spot For Pardot.

By |2021-09-21T15:09:57+00:00September 21st, 2021|Categories: Campaigns, Data Management, Salesforce|
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Are you Ready for the Pardot Prospect Mailability Upgrade?

Pardot announced some big prospect mailability changes in their Summer ‘21 release, and those changes are becoming permanent for everyone with the Winter ‘22 release. 

So, let’s break down exactly what’s changing, what your Pardot users need to know, and how to protect your prospects’ email preferences after this change. 

What’s changing?

Currently Pardot has two fields that control a prospect’s mailability:

Opted Out: Indicates the prospect has unsubscribed from marketing emails. Prospects who have opted out can still receive operational emails (a.k.a transactional emails) and autoresponders.

Do Not Email: Indicates the prospect cannot receive any email communications at all.

Things are about to get a lot more granular with the new prospect mailability changes. Pardot is adding a “Mailbility Insights” section to the prospect page with six fields:

mailability fields
  1. Status: Outlines which kinds of emails prospects can receive and their overall mailable status.
  2. Email Uniqueness: Records if the prospect’s email address has any duplicates in Pardot.
  3. Opted Out: Indicates the prospect has unsubscribed from marketing emails. These prospects can still receive operational emails and autoresponders. 
  4. Do Not Email: Indicates an internal user has suppressed this prospect from marketing emails. These prospects can still receive operational emails and autoresponders.
  5. Soft Bounce Detected: Indicates the prospect’s email address has returned soft bounce(s) from an email send. A soft bounce occurs when an email is recognized by the recipient’s mail server but is returned to the sender because the recipient’s mailbox is full or the mail server is temporarily unavailable. Prospects with a soft bounce may be able to receive emails at a later time.
  6. Hard Bounce Detected: Indicates the prospect’s email address has returned hard bounces from an email send. A hard bounce occurs when the prospect’s email address is invalid, the domain name does not exist, or the sender is suspected as spam and/or has been blocked. Prospects with a hard bounce are no longer mailable. 
undeliverable prospects

Previously when a prospect was marked as Opted Out, the Do Not Email field would also change to “TRUE.” This is no longer the case with the new update. 

This change also enables a new filter to view Undeliverable Prospects (a.k.a prospects who  have received a hard bounce or 5 soft bounces).

More changes to note

  • All Pardot users will have access to update prospect Opted Out and Do Not Email fields. The Pardot user role permission “Toggle Opt-In Status” will no longer restrict access to the Opted Out field. However, this may change with future releases (Pretty please Pardot product managers 🤞🤞🤞).
  • Overwrite Prospect Opt Out Field is enabled by default.
  • A prospect’s number of soft bounces can be reset (remember 5 soft bounces equal a hard bounce).
    soft bounce detected
  • Pardot will mark a prospect with a hard bounce as “Undeliverable.” But, it will no longer automatically change their Do Not Email field to TRUE.
  • The only way to resolve a prospect’s hard bounce status is to change their email address to an address that does not have a hard bounce.

New prospect mailability capabilities

The prospect mailability upgrade also includes new ways to edit, update, and use the prospect mailability fields. You can edit or manually query these fields on the prospect page through an import or via automation rules, dynamic lists, completion actions, and Engagement Studio programs.

prospect mailability automation rules
prospect email status

Ensure these new features are used correctly

With great power comes great responsibility. So, work with your users to ensure everyone understands the new mailability updates and when or when not to change a prospect’s status. 

I recommend that you:

  • Review your Pardot user roles to determine which user roles have access to change the Opted Out and Do Not Email fields. You’ll want to look for the access to create/edit:
    1. Automation Rules
    2. Page Actions
    3. Custom Redirects
    4. Files
    5. Emails
    6. Forms 
    7. Form Handlers
    8. Engagement Studio Programs
    9. Prospects

      You can learn about the permissions for the four default user roles here.

  • Train your users on bounce codes and outline which codes can be resolved and which cannot. Make sure you avoid re-contacting email addresses that will never be successful. Contacting those addresses can have a severe impact on your send reputation!
  • Read Lindsey Mark’s post about how to align your data after the upgrade. 

How should you use these new fields?

Here are a few tips that should help you navigate through the new features.

  • Mark incoming prospects as “Do Not Email” until they have explicitly subscribed to your marketing materials. This will allow you to track, score, and grade the prospect while still respecting their email preferences. 
  • Regularly review your soft and hard bounce error codes by creating dynamic lists of prospects with errors.
  • Edit (or create) your double opt-in process to ensure prospects who subscribed but have not yet confirmed their email address are marked only as Do Not Email. 

How do you plan on using Pardot’s new Mailability upgrade? Let us know in the comments!

The post Are you Ready for the Pardot Prospect Mailability Upgrade? appeared first on The Spot For Pardot.

By |2021-09-02T19:09:16+00:00September 2nd, 2021|Categories: Compliance, Email Marketing, New Pardot Features, Pardot Release Notes, Release Notes|
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Creating a Pardot Spam Identification Process with Prospect Updater

Spam and junk data is the bane of my Pardot Admin existence. Nothing irks me more than seeing sales was notified of a form fill from [email protected], or that [email protected] was added to an engagement program. However, spam is an inevitable part of any marketing automation platform and there is only so much we can do to prevent it from entering, or remaining within, the system.

Kick Out the Spams

Song references aside, there are a number of things we can do to give junk data the boot from Pardot. I typically recommend creating dynamic lists that look for spam keywords in the most common Pardot Prospect fields (more info here). Then, use these lists to review and delete junk data on a regular basis. This process works great for small and mid-sized Pardot instances. But dynamic lists alone leave something to be desired for Pardot instances that intake thousands of new prospects a day.

When using Pardot native functionalities to identify junk, I found myself wanting to know why a prospect matched my junk lists:

  • Which field on the prospect’s record was raising the spam flag? 
  • Is this legit junk or do my junk lists need to be tweaked? 

Unable to solve this issue with native Pardot functionality alone, I turned to our Prospect Updater tool to see if I could turn this into a spam identification tool. With some tweaking and a lot of input from the Sercante Labs team, I was able to create a process that not only tells me why a prospect matched my spam criteria, but also allows me to easily manage spam clean up through the use of tags and automations rules. 

Prospect Updater to the Rescue

With Prospect Updater, we moved the criteria from our junk catcher dynamic lists over to  Google Sheets and created two new Pardot fields for the updater to use; “Spam Status” and “Spam Rules Matched.” Prospect Updater then compares all prospects in Pardot to the rules in the Google Sheet and updates their “Spam Status” field with one of the following values:

  • Suspected Spam: Prospect Updater has determined this prospect matches one of the spam rules.
  • Confirmed Spam: The Prospect has been reviewed and deemed to be spam
  • Not Spam: The Prospect matches one or more of the spam rules but has been reviewed and is deemed not to be spam. The Prospect will be excluded from future Prospect Updater spam reviews. 
  • Reset: The Prospect’s junk data has been corrected. Prospect Updater will include this Prospect in future spam reviews. 

The “Spam Rule Matched” field is also stamped with which spam criteria the Prospect matched. 

Once the Prospect Updater Spam Identification process was up and running, I created new dynamic lists that collected Prospects marked as “Suspected Spam” and grouped them by the field that was spammy. This allows me to easily review and clean up these prospects on a regular basis. 

Spam Identification Process with Prospect Updater

Automate All the Things

To make the spam review process even easier, I put automation rules in place that would allow me to update prospects by tagging them or changing their “Spam Status” value. That way, I could use whichever update method was easiest at the moment. 

For instance: 

  • If a Prospect is indeed spam
Spam Identification Process with Prospect Updater
  • If a Prospect will always match spam but is not actually spam (i.e. Pamela Smith with email SPam[email protected])
Spam Identification Process with Prospect Updater - not spam
  • If a Prospect has been edited to no longer match spam rules
Spam Identification Process with Prospect Updater - reset spam

Having the “Spam Status” fields also allows me to create a suppression or “holding” dynamic list where new prospects will not be emailed until their “Spam Status” field is updated.

Spam Identification Process with Prospect Updater - dynamic list rules

This process now runs like a well-oiled machine. It allows us to easily identify and kick out junk data and prevent said data from causing any damage in the short time it exists in Pardot. 

Implementing the Prospect Updater Spam Identification Process

Set up and implementation of Prospect Updater is pretty painless. The first thing we need to do is set up a connected app: 

  • Complete the form on this page to get the package from us
  • Install our Salesforce Package
  • Set up a user and pre-authorize them to use the Connected App

The team will give you all the details and support you need to get this set up properly.

While the cogs are starting to move on that process, you can schedule a meeting with the Sercante Labs team to talk through your spam use case and any other challenges you might have for Prospect Updater. It can do a lot, and your wish is its command. The Sercante Labs team will then go back and do what developers do, and push buttons and stuff. 

Once your Prospect Updater configuration is complete, the only thing left is a final training session to make sure you and your team are equipped to create, modify and maintain your new Super Spam Spotting System plus any other cool things you want to do with it (data clean up and normalization, maybe?). 

Interested? Give the Labs team a shout through the form on the bottom of the Prospect Updater for Pardot page.

Thanks to Mike Fazio & Adam Erstelle for contributing to this solution.

The post Creating a Pardot Spam Identification Process with Prospect Updater appeared first on The Spot For Pardot.

By |2021-08-30T18:41:57+00:00August 30th, 2021|Categories: Data Management, Email Marketing, prospect updater, Sercante Labs|
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