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Prove the Impact of Your Conversational Marketing Strategy with Campaign Influence

As a marketing team, you spend tons of time and resources building marketing campaigns that drive people to your website. Your website is the perfect place for prospects to learn about what you do and, most importantly, let you know who they are. As one of your most valuable assets, capitalizing on website visitors is just as important as getting them there. 

That’s where conversational marketing platforms, like Qualified, come into play. 

Conversational marketing is becoming a common tool in many marketers’ belts because, well, it works a lot better than standard marketing forms at increasing website conversions and capturing leads from target accounts. (See more in our blog post: When ABM Meets Conversational Marketing).  

As Qualified has said in their recent financing announcement, “Every year, B2B marketers spend more than $6 billion driving buyers to their website, but sales teams have no way of knowing when a qualified buyer has arrived, and no way of speaking with that buyer in that pivotal moment.” 

When you’re spending that much money to get people to your website, two things come to mind: 

  1. You need to have a top notch strategy to convert them and alert the right people on your team when a target account is on your site
  2. You need to be able to report on how your conversion tools are providing a return on investment

This post is focused on #2. Once you’re bringing in Leads and qualified accounts through a Conversational Marketing tool, how do you make sure you’re getting credit for those conversions and tying the work you did back to revenue? 

If you really want to make your execs and sales leaders heart-eyed, connect the dots between what’s happening on the marketing side of the house and what’s influencing and closing deals. Here’s how. 

Step 1: Campaign Attribution 

To understand who’s engaging with your Conversational Marketing platform, you need to be able to attribute engagement to marketing campaigns. With Qualified, you build your Conversational Marketing reports in Salesforce where your entire team can access and understand them. 

The first step is to set up experiences in Qualified so that, when someone engages with your Conversational Marketing tool, they are attributed to the right Salsforce campaign with a designated member status. 

Campaign Attribution shows how multiple Campaigns can have influence over a particular Lead/Contact. If you’re already tracking marketing activities like Email, Webinars, and Events, you can add Conversational Marketing as a Campaign “type” to track alongside your other Campaign Dashboards to measure Conversational Marketing impact. 

Step 2: Configure Campaign Influence 

If the Contacts you’re attributing to Campaigns in Step 1 are also tied to Opportunities through Contact Roles, then we’re in business. You can start reporting on how Conversational Marketing experiences are driving ROI for your business by enabling Campaign Influence in Salesforce. 

Side note: If you’re missing Contact Roles on Opportunities, check our our app to help you automate who is linked to Opportunities upon their creation: Automated Opportunity Contact Roles 

With Campaign Influence, the Contact links the Campaign to the Opportunity, allowing you to see which Campaigns are influencing Opportunities. Then based on the Opportunity value, you can see how much money marketing campaigns are contributing to your pipeline. 

Now that your Leads and Contacts who have engaged with Qualified are being tied to the right Salesforce Campaign through Campaign Attribution, you can start reporting on that engagement in really cool ways. The next step is to understand how your Conversation Marketing tool is helping seal deals and bring in valuable Contacts that you didn’t have insight into before. 

Example Reports

Here are some of the reports you can build once you have Campaign Influence ready to go to show how Conversational Marketing Campaigns are influencing the bottom line. Just set up your Campaign Influence dashboard with a filter for Campaign Type. If you’re capturing Leads through your Conversational Marketing tool and attributing them to the right Campaigns in step 1, then, when those Leads convert to Contacts and are tied to Opportunities, they will pull into these reports as Campaign Influence records. 

Report Type: Campaigns with Influenced Opportunities

Filter: Campaign Type = Conversational Marketing  

  • Total Influence Opportunities – Shows how many Opportunities have been influenced by Conversational Marketing 
  • Total Influenced Pipeline  (First Touch, Last Touch, and Even Distribution Models) – Shows how much money in the pipeline has been influenced by Conversational Marketing. The different distribution models allow you to see whether Conversational Marketing was the campaign that brought them in (first touch), the campaign that sealed the deal (last touch), or influenced the Contact anywhere along their journey (even touch). 
  • Total Influenced Pipeline, filtered for Target Accounts – Shows how much money in the pipeline Conversational Marketing has influenced for Target Accounts only (this could be eye opening when you compare with other Campaign Types because tools like Qualified are especially adept at personalizing experiences for target accounts and getting them to convert when they’re hot.)
  • Won Influence Revenue YTD – Shows how much revenue in the bank Conversational Marketing has contributed to 
  • Won Influenced Revenue, filtered for Target Accounts – Shows how much revenue in the bank Conversational Marketing has contributed to from Target Accounts only 

Here’s an example of what your Campaign Influence Dashboard could look like for all Campaign Types. You could then set up a filter for Campaign Type = Conversational Marketing  to see a honed-in view of how your Conversational Marketing campaigns are bringing in the dough. 

Take the Next Step with Conversational Marketing 

Conversational Marketing is a great way to make your website work for you and to keep the sales team busy with high-intent visitors. Once you have a consistent Conversational strategy in place, getting credit for your efforts is the next step, and Campaign Influence is the most direct way to show results around Opportunities and revenue. 

Want to see how you can grow your sales pipeline and drive with Qualified? Need help getting started with Campaign Influence? We’d love to learn more. Get in touch! 

The post Prove the Impact of Your Conversational Marketing Strategy with Campaign Influence appeared first on The Spot For Pardot.

By |2020-09-22T11:58:13+00:00September 22nd, 2020|Categories: Uncategorized|

How To Map Lookup Fields in Pardot

BY CELINE NEWSOME AND MIKE CREUZER 

Have you tried to map an important Salesforce field in Pardot, only to realize it’s not available in the Pardot field mapping dropdown list? Yeah, me too. The most common reason for this…It’s a dang lookup field in Salesforce, and Pardot doesn’t like lookup fields. 

If you’re wondering what a lookup field is, it’s when a field value is being sourced from another field or object.

Side note: User lookup fields are an exception here. Salesforce user lookup fields can be mapped to Pardot CRM User type fields.

If you’re still thinking you need that field in Pardot even though standard functionality won’t allow it, lucky for you, we have three solutions so you can still create and map the field you need in Pardot.

1. Create a Flow or Process Builder in Salesforce

This solution is great when you want to automatically trigger a record sync as field values change.

Step 1: Create a custom text field on the desired object in Salesforce

Step 2: Create criteria in Process Builder for the object of interest (see screenshot below)

Step 3: Define the criteria for the action group (see screenshot below)

Step 4. Create and map your new field in Pardot

Viola! Problem solved. 

2. Custom Formula Field

Formula Fields can grab any specific field in the lookup object and pull its data into a new field that you can map in Pardot.  A couple things to note about using a formula field as your solution:

  • This isn’t a great option when your lookup fields change frequently, because formula fields do not trigger a sync.
  • Avoid confusion when looking at another field on the object by making this field hidden for all users except the Pardot Connector User.

Step 1: Create a Lookup Field on your object of choice (Lead/Contact/Account)

Step 2: Create a new Formula Field on the same object

Step 3: Create a formula for “Insert Field” and pick the field on the Lookup Field object (see screenshot below)

Step 4: Save the formula

Step 5. Create and map your new field in Pardot

Viola, again! Another solution.

  1. Custom Object

This could be the solution when you can’t use a default object, meaning you don’t have a one-to-one data relationship but you want to use complex filtering within Pardot. 

Custom Objects are available in Pardot Advanced Edition and Available for an additional cost in Pardot Plus Edition

For this solution we would be pulling in the ‘Individual’ Salesforce object into Pardot. Pardot can run automation around a custom object in your CRM that is not a Pardot default object. The custom object must be tied to a Pardot prospect record through a prospect ID. You can create and sync a custom object from any queryable object that is linked to a contact, lead, or account in your CRM.

Step 1: Create a Custom Object in Pardot (Custom Objects must be enabled in your account first)

Step 2: Use criteria in Pardot to pull the data in a list. To use this field as a custom object, we need to ‘relate’ the value back to the prospect. This is done with the “Prospect Custom Object” related with properties.

Step 3: Click Run Rules and use your list as you normally would.

And, there you have it, our final voila! 

Have you found another solution to map lookup fields into Pardot? Comment below and share.

The post How To Map Lookup Fields in Pardot appeared first on The Spot For Pardot.

By |2020-09-09T19:12:08+00:00September 9th, 2020|Categories: Data Management|

Close the Loop on Events: Splash and Pardot Integration

BY WHITNEY ROSA

Splash – a super-powerful event marketing platform – helps organizations make in-person and virtual marketing efficient and successful. Splash lets you create branded registration forms, custom event promotions like emails, social share cards, and more while tracking registrations and analytics seamlessly on the dashboard. Think, Eventbrite on steroids. 

The Splash integrations enable you to close the loop on your events and see the impact on your bottom line. Specifically, with the Splash and Pardot integrations you’re able to consolidate your data into one tool and bring event marketing into the fold within Pardot. 

First things first: Access Needed to Enable the Integrations

There are multiple tiers to Splash: Free, Basic, Pro, and Enterprise. To be able to integrate into Pardot, you need to have access to their integrations and API. This begins at the Basic level and is included on each level above that. Have a Basic or higher Splash account? Let’s move on.

Integrating Splash and Pardot

Splash integrates with Pardot in three ways: form handlers, prospects, and campaigns. With these integrations, you can bring event marketing into Pardot to sync your data. 

Having Splash data in Pardot also means you can continue to market and nurture your leads and prospects even after your event through engagement studio programs, automation rules, and more. Another added benefit is that you could create all of your pre-event and post-event email marketing in Pardot to ensure leads are getting the right messages and streamline your reporting. 

Use case 1: Maintain compliance with form handlers and completion actions 

You can integrate Splash and Pardot using form handlers. This integration is available on an event or theme level as well as an organizational level. As a best practice we’d suggest using this integration on the event level. A great use case for the form handler  integration is managing unsubscribes. If someone unsubscribes through a Splash email, you can use a form handler to pass that data to Pardot. From there, it’ll update the record and with completion actions on the form handler, you can unsubscribe the prospect from all emails in Pardot. Hello compliance! 

To start this integration you’ll need to first create your form handlers based on statuses. For example, an ‘RSVP yes’ or a ‘Checked-in’ status. You’ll create a new form handler integration and follow the steps.

Step 1. In Pardot create form handler. 

Once you’ve created the form handler within Pardot, navigate back to Splash and create a new event.

Step 2. Create an Event page and publish in Splash.

 

Next you’ll go to Integration on your event and select New Integration.

Step 3. Create the Splash Integration.

Step 4. Be sure your event integration is turned on and give it a test!

Also keep in mind that you can access an activity log on the integrations within Splash to look for recent activity, troubleshoot, and ensure it’s working properly.  

Use Case 2: Create and Update Prospects

With this integration, you can create net new prospects in Pardot and update existing prospects. Any field you have on your Splash registration page can be pushed to Pardot via field mapping. This feature can be configured on an organizational level AND an event level making it really customizable. 

On a basic level, you’ll choose your trigger and then your action in Splash. For example, the trigger could be ‘Attendee’ and the action could be ‘RSVP yes’. So every time an attendee RSVPs as attending the integration will run. You can then choose to update an existing prospect or create a new one. 

Watch for a gotcha here! You could end up with duplicate prospects if you create a new prospect each time. Check your use case and choose carefully whether you want the integration to update an existing prospect or create a new one. And remember that, in Pardot, email is the unique identifier. 

The next step in this integration is to associate these prospects with a campaign. Your campaign list will automatically import from Pardot so you can choose the right campaign from the dropdown. From here you need to map your Splash fields to your Pardot fields so the data can sync. Lastly, you test! 

Use Case 3: Integrate Pardot Campaigns with Splash 

If you haven’t upgraded to connected campaigns within Pardot, you can integrate your Pardot campaigns with Splash. In this integration, campaigns are used to represent events in Pardot. You can configure the integration to automatically create new campaigns in Pardot as events are created in Splash, and then have the campaign update so that as changes happen, the fields in Pardot will be tracked. Think location or date fields being tracked and updated in Pardot. 

This integration is done directly on the integration page of your Splash account and then verified within Pardot and is done on the organizational level within Pardot.

Close the Loop on Your Marketing Events

Completion actions, engagement studio programs, and more are what make these integrations so powerful. You can continue to nurture and market your prospects even after an event, making events an integral part of your funnel. What do you think? Are you ready to close the loop on your event marketing? 

Get in touch to learn more. 

The post Close the Loop on Events: Splash and Pardot Integration appeared first on The Spot For Pardot.

By |2020-09-03T11:56:30+00:00September 3rd, 2020|Categories: Uncategorized|

Creative Ways to Personalize Your Marketing with Pardot Advanced Dynamic Content

BY ERIN DUNCAN

Before we dig into the meat of this post and some cool ways you can personalize your marketing efforts, let’s take a step back and start with…

“What is Advanced Dynamic Content?”

Advanced Dynamic Content displays custom HTML based on the Prospect’s criteria and allows you to customize messaging to the prospect. 

For example, if am trying to sell Pardot to a Sales executive, I might use the subject line, “Increase your close rate with Marketing Automation”, but if I am trying to sell Pardot to a Marketing Automation Manager, I might use, “Automate and personalize your Prospect journey with Pardot”. 

Advanced Dynamic Content can be used on Pardot Forms, Landing Pages, and emails and is available for Plus and Advanced editions. 

But wait, why should I worry about personalization in the first place?

Prospects are increasingly expecting a personalized experience and personalization has consistently been shown to increase sales and engagement. Personalization can increase sales by 19%, email opens by 29%, and email clicks by a whopping 41%! (Source: https://www.pardot.com/blog/5-incredible-examples-personalized-marketing/)

Customers are also more likely to switch brands if their experience is not customized. (Source: Salesforce State of Marketing Report: https://c1.sfdcstatic.com/content/dam/web/en_us/www/assets/pdf/datasheets/salesforce-research-fourth-annual-state-of-marketing.pdf)

Isn’t Handlebars Merge Language replacing Advanced Dynamic Content?

Nope! HML adds a new tool to your arsenal for delivering tailored content to your prospects, but there are use cases for both Dynamic Content and HML. With HML you can write if statements right in your emails, while Advanced Dynamic Content provides you more of a library of prewritten content to use based on the Prospect’s data. Learn more about HML in our blog here. And if you really want to get tricky, learn how you can use HML and scoring categories to fuel dynamic content in our blog post here

Ok, back to the topic at hand.  What are some fancy ways you can use Advanced Dynamic Content?

Use Dynamic Content on Standard Areas of your Email Templates

If you have standard language on every single one of your email templates (such as Terms & Conditions, Privacy Policies, legal mumbo-jumbo, etc.) and this language ever changes, you will have to edit every single one of your email templates. To avoid this pain, make this standard language dynamic content. That way, if it ever changes, you only have to update it in one place!

For example, if your standard footer language looks something like this: 

Set up your Dynamic Content with a variation that will match all prospects and enter your standard footer content into each variation.

Finally, replace your standard footer content with your Dynamic Content tag.

(You’ll need to leave the unsubscribe or email preference center link outside of the dynamic content because Pardot needs to see that one of these links is on your email drafts.)

Use Dynamic Content to Manage Translations

If you have an international client base, consider adding Dynamic Content to your forms and landing pages. This example does rely on you capturing the language the prospect speaks somewhere on the prospect’s profile. 

Create Content for Each Stage of the Prospect Lifecycle

Pardot has 5 Lifecycle Stages for prospects:

  1. Visitor: an anonymous individual who has visited your website or Pardot-tracked assets
  2. Prospect: a Visitor who has converted and is associated with an email address.
  3. Marketing Qualified Leads (MQLs): a prospect that has been assigned to a user
  4. Sales Qualified Leads (SQLs): a prospect who has been assigned to a user and associated with an opportunity in Salesforce
  5. Won Deals: the opportunity the prospect is associated with is changed to “Closed Won”.

The stage a prospect is in is not recorded on each prospect’s profile, but you can easily make that happen with a few automation rules and these instructions.

Once you identify which Lifecycle stage the prospect is currently in, you can use your Dynamic Content to personalize messaging based on the stage. 

For example, if you’re connecting with a prospect who is still in the MQL stage, you may highlight the features of your products or offerings. However, if you are connecting with a prospect who is in the “Won Deals” stage, they’re likely more familiar with the features of your products and offerings already, so they may want to hear about recent case studies or new features you’ve added. 

Customize a “Next Step” CTA for the Prospect

When a prospect fills out a form, the subsequent thank you or success page should not be a dead-end. With dynamic content, you can use these pages to show prospects a “Next Step” CTA that is personalized to them. 

For example, if this is a brand new prospect, you may ask them to subscribe to your emails or link to an overview of your products so they can learn more. If the prospect is a current customer and subscriber, serving up the same content as you would for the brand new prospect is not going to be relevant, so show current customer white papers, case studies, or use the CTA for a cross-sell opportunity.

Ongoing Personalization through Padot 

As you can see, personalizing your marketing is something customers have come to expect and, fortunately, it’s totally doable in Pardot! All you need is a use case and a little creativity. 

What are some interesting ways you’ve used advanced dynamic content? We’d love to hear in the comments!

The post Creative Ways to Personalize Your Marketing with Pardot Advanced Dynamic Content appeared first on The Spot For Pardot.

By |2020-08-03T08:31:00+00:00August 3rd, 2020|Categories: Uncategorized|

15 Resources To Make The Most Of Your Landing Pages: The Ultimate List for Pardot Admins

BY: MARCOS DURAN

Building landing pages in Pardot can be an interesting challenge because, depending on your needs and the skillset of your team, there are multiple ways to go about it. 

On one hand, you have the Pardot landing page content builder that leverages Stock Templates. By using this editor, you are allowed to drag and drop sections into a blank canvas. This is where you build out the content and apply a form for each specific landing page.

The landing page builder is a good way to create landing pages fast with zero coding experience. One detail to point out here is that Stock Templates aren’t as adaptive on tablets and mobile devices, so be sure to test them out prior to making them public.

Your other option is to create custom layout templates which give you a lot more flexibility when it comes to how your product will look, but requires coding knowledge (think HTML, CSS, Javascript) to get the look you want. 

To get you started, Pardot gives you access to five out-of-the-box layout templates. However, they’re pretty neutral, so if you want landing pages customized to your branding and design standards, you’ll need to invest some resources and build new ones.

You may have a front-end developer on your team to create the perfect layout templates for all of your landing page needs. If so, that’s great! This post is probably not for you. Go ahead and leverage them. 

If you’re here because your team is nibble and mighty but wears many hats, this post is meant for you!

Landing Page Design Challenges Pardot Admins Face

As a team that’s trying to do a lot with limited resources, here are some challenges you may be facing:

  • Creating thank you pages
  • Maintaining consistent branding
  • Personalizing landing pages for each event/webinar
  • Adapting and checking for mobile responsiveness
  • Testing your content

These challenges can definitely seem overwhelming for ANY Pardot admin who may not have prior experience creating landing pages. Luckily, this guide can help you make your own landing page (or website) edits with a few simple clicks to Pardot layout templates.

NOTICE: Some of these resources do require that you have basic HTML/CSS understanding to be able to use them properly and some of the options have paid versions for more access (you don’t need them to get started), but trust me, I’m here to bring you these blessings for free!


15 Resources to Bring Your Pardot Landing Pages to Life 

Basics

1. Favicons 

Add branding to your browser tabs by using this tool to generate favicons. Once you generate your favicon code, it can be added to your landing page and form layout templates to keep consistent branding across your website. Follow the instructions on the Pardot Knowledge Base to self implement.

2. Google Fonts

This resource outlines web-safe and free fonts you can use on your landing pages. The most popular fonts include: Fire Sans, Montserrat, Lato, Open Sans, Oswald, Raleway, and Roboto. To use these custom fonts you can find a guide on how to implement this on the Pardot Knowledge Base. Note: Custom fonts on landing pages act differently than emails (including how you set them up). 

3. Meta Tags

Generate code to create social media meta tags for Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Pinterest, and Google.  Just plug in your site’s information to get started. Note: This method would likely require a new layout template per landing page in order to update it. 

4. Pardot-Content Regions – Landing Pages 

Pardot Content Regions give you flexibility to lock down content controls to users creating landing pages. Need content restricted? There’s a tag for that. Need content to be flexible with the full WYSIWYG editor? There’s a tag for that as well!

5. Responsive CSS Grid Fundamentals
This resource outlines the usage of the grid capability to make rows responsive. This is a fairly advanced topic (probably the most from this guide), but with a little bit of testing and “googling” you will become a master in no time!

Personalize 

6. Pexels

Spice up your landing pages with compelling images. This resource provides you with free commercial and personal use images. Simply search terms for your specific landing pages needs and select the best image.

7. Font Awesome

Search and find over 1000 custom icons with Font Awesome. These icons can be used to add context to your landing page offering. To use these, just grab the stylesheet provided and add it to your landing page layout template. Then you can reference the icons following the guide included on the Font Awesome website.

8. Color Schemes

Looking to add a little more color to your landing pages? Color Schemes is a great tool to create dynamic color palettes. To use this tool simply add your HEX or RGB codes from your branding guide and out goes the color series. Don’t know the color codes? Try their image to color generator.

Delight

9. Countdown Timers

Add a little flair and excitement to your emails, landing pages, and website with Countdown Timers. To use this tool, simply create a free account, add your timing, and then add the code to your landing page. Note: this can also be used in emails but be careful as there are limitations across email clients

10. Eventable (Calendar Invite Sharing)

Building landing pages for events or webinars held on specific dates? Use this tool to create Add-To calendar buttons, which can be added to your thank you pages, form thank you content or emails.

11. Social Cards 

This resource helps you generate code for a social card, no code involved. When you get to their website, there’s a short tutorial on how to set everything up. Basically, all you have to do is run through their generator and login to the right social media account to post. Currently, Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook are available. Note: the description does not show up on LinkedIn.

Testing

12. HotJar

Gain insight into how traffic on your site moves around and where they click. With this information from HotJar, you’ll be able to test different layouts/content positioning to see which aspects of the page resonate with viewers. This is a great addition to Google Analytics (separate platforms / different metrics). Note: To use this tool you do need to set up an account, but you can use it for free while you test it.

13. JSFiddle Editor 

Use this resource to try out code, edit, and preview in real time. This is an opensource tool that can save you from a tight bind if you don’t have access to a classic editor like Adobe Dreamweaver. A desktop alternative is Atom (which plug can plug into GitHub if you need it).

14. Multivariate Testing Landing Pages

Multivariate testing is a  Pardot feature for landing pages that lets you test two versions of a landing page and choose a winner. This FAQs blog from Pardot  breaks down the difference between A/B testing and multivariate testing, what to test, and what reporting looks like. Use this documentation to set up multivariate testing in Pardot.

15. Responsive Design Checker

Test your landing pages’ responsiveness with this Responsive Design Checker, which allows you to review any online asset (landing page, forms, and websites) by screen size and different devices. To use this tool simply add a HTTPS link to the search bar and use the left panel to get real time previews. Note: It’s about 95% accurate, does not play well with websites heavily based on Javascript, nor will it work for your Pardot emails.


Spice Up Your Landing Pages

In the end, we all wish we could code beautiful landing pages from scratch. As marketers, we wear many hats and sometimes being able to make some quick changes here and there can enable you to support your team on the fly. If you don’t have the luxury of an in-house designer, these resources should help get you where you need to be.

What are your favorite go-to landing page resources?

Do you need support building your own customized landing page templates? Our development team is ready to invigorate your landing page designs and add the functionality you need. Reach out to us here to get started.

The post 15 Resources To Make The Most Of Your Landing Pages: The Ultimate List for Pardot Admins appeared first on The Spot For Pardot.

By |2020-06-17T13:20:44+00:00June 17th, 2020|Categories: Uncategorized|

COOOOO-KIEEEES: Preparing for Google Chrome 80 and Pardot HTTPS Updates

BY NATASHA WETTEN

If you’re a Pardot Admin, you might’ve received an email recently that either made total sense or perhaps went quickly into the “deal with it later” email pile. It’s about — jargon alert — “SameSite cookie attributes,” and we’ll tell you exactly what you need to do.

In February 2020, Google is releasing Chrome 80, which will impact the behavior of third-party cookies. Basically, Chrome is going to require that third-party cookies, like those used by Pardot and many other web technologies, need to be served over secure connections. There’s a Chromium blog post here with an overview, and a REALLY TECHNICAL document here.

To avoid issues tracking prospects on your Pardot tracker domain, you’ll need to enable HTTPS and SSL, but in the right way! There are some “gotchas” here, so let’s dive in.

First, check on your tracker domains.

  • In Pardot open your “Domain Management” page
    • In Classic this is under Admin >> Domain Management
    • In Lightning this is under Pardot Settings >> Domain Management
  • Under “Tracker Domains” check the “SSL Status” and “HTTPS Status” columns for each of your domains. 
    • If you see a lot of green, you are all set!
Green, as usual, is good.
  • If you see a grey “HTTP” Status or your “SSL Status” says “Disabled”, you need to take action.
Grey – not so good.

Here’s where the gotcha comes in. Before you update, check your landing page template for mixed content. 

If you enable HTTPS for your primary tracker domain, but you have active landing pages that include HTTP Pardot-hosted assets (think: images, .css files), then your landing pages will not look as intended. It’s because of mixed content.

Next, check your templates.

If you’re about to or have recently enabled HTTPS, audit your existing landing page templates in Pardot and update any hosted assets within those landing page templates that are currently “http” to “https” within the code.

Pro tip: use the search bar to help, enter “http:” to find each one you need to update.

Like this:

Once you have done that for all of your active landing page templates, you can now turn on HTTPS inside of Domain Management.

Another pro tip! After you switch to HTTPS, spot check some of your landing pages to make sure nothing looks off. If it does, go to the landing page template that is powering that landing page and comb through to make sure all instances of HTTP are updated to HTTPS.

Next: Check your iFrames and any Pardot-hosted content.

If you are using Pardot forms on your website through embedded iFrames, check the code. If you see “<iframe src=”http://…“ then switch out the http for an https, like below:

That goes for any content hosted in Pardot as well. For example: You have a direct link to a PDF on a thank you page that’s on your website, and it’s using your tracker domain because you want to track clicks – “http://go.yoursite.com/awesome-pdf-everyone-wants-to-get” – yep, this needs to change to https as well.

A final note: make sure you’re using SSL for your website domain

If you’re not currently using SSL for your domain, you will need to. Without it, the Pardot cookie will not get served to your website visitors after the update and effectively get eaten by SameSite! Also, this is best practice: Google is flagging sites that don’t use SSL, and is ranking secured sites higher in results.

Secondly: once you chance to SSL, you still might have absolute links on your site that are using http. You can use a site like https://www.jitbit.com/sslcheck/ to find any SSL errors.

That’s a lot – and as you can see, the issue can extend beyond Pardot. If you need assistance or have any questions, let us know in the comments.

By |2020-01-22T20:47:25+00:00January 22nd, 2020|Categories: Uncategorized|

Sercante Achieves Education & Nonprofit Cloud Certified Navigator Status

Sercante is proud to share that we’ve been recognized as a Certified Navigator for Salesforce.org customers using Nonprofit Cloud and Education Cloud. 

We are excited by this recognition and look forward to opportunities to continue helping Nonprofits and Higher Education institutions be successful on the Salesforce platform. 

What has Sercante done to grow its Nonprofit & Higher Ed team?

 After hiring several new team members with deep experience in the Salesforce.org ecosystem, we tuned our focus to upskilling our team.  7 team members have dug in, hit Trailhead, and earned the Nonprofit Cloud and Education Cloud Consultant certifications.

Our team also took on 5x more Salesforce.org clients in 2019 compared to previous year (and helped those clients see amazing results!).

What is the Salesforce Navigator Program?

The Navigator statuses help customers find the right partner for them based on a partner’s proven expertise in a Salesforce product. Based on expertise, product knowledge, and customer success, a partner can earn a status of Certified, Specialist, and Master Navigator. 

You can find Sercante’s Navigator statuses in Pardot, Sales Cloud, and Salesforce.org products on their AppExchange listing here

What’s next for Sercante with Salesforce.org?

Our team plans to double-down on our passion for the Salesforce.org community in 2020. We’ll be working hard to bring top-notch Pardot support to our Salesforce.org customers and the Power of Us community. 

We’ll be focusing on growing our team, digging deeper with our values, and leading the way for exceptional customer service. We have some exciting tools, upcoming Nonprofit and Higher Education success stories, and new Pardot-focused classes coming down the pipeline. 

Want to hear more about our work with Salesforce.org customers?

We’d love to chat about your needs and how we can help. Reach out to us at any time through our Contact Us form or in our Qualified chatbot on our website.

By |2020-02-05T16:57:54+00:00January 15th, 2020|Categories: Uncategorized|

Conversational Marketing: a Debrief of the Portland B2B Marketing User Group

You’ve probably heard about conversational marketing or, at the very least, experienced it. It’s that chat window that pops up allowing you to have a real-time conversation with a company when you’re visiting their website.

At a recent Portland, OR B2B Marketers User Group, we dove into a deep discussion about conversational marketing. Many of the members have conversational marketing set up at their company to varying degrees.

We all took the stance of how we, as a prospect (not as the marketer), have engaged with a chat window on a company’s website. And we dug into why we engaged, to see how this could make us better marketers.

Conversational marketing: a doorway to personalized content and human interaction

Think back to the last time you engaged with a chatbot.

Most Portland user group members reported being mostly likely to engage when they feel there’s a real person behind it personalizing the experience, waiting for you to reply. It was also rare that we ran into these high-quality, engaging chat windows.

The more we dug into our experiences, we noticed the chat windows we have engaged with were heavily using personalization to draw us in. They called out what we’d seen on their website already and tailored their content to what they knew about us. And they assured us we could talk to a real person.

The role of trust in prospect interaction

My biggest takeaway from the user group discussion was most people began engaging with a chat window when they knew there was a human behind it, earning their trust. The idea of having to staff a chatbot can be a tough pill to swallow, but it immediately earns trust when there’s a real person waiting to talk.

And in 2019, not having trust with a company can be a deal-breaker.

According to the 2019 Edelman Trust Barometer Special Report, only one-third of consumers trust the brands they buy. And 81% of survey respondents said trust is a deal-breaker when considering a purchase.

But, Edelman says:

“Brands can build trust by communicating with consumers through various platforms and voices, not with advertising alone.”

Introducing Qualified for conversational marketing 

Our user group meeting discussion had actually been sparked by a demo of Qualified, a conversational marketing app built specifically for Pardot.

Even though many people in the room had a conversational marketing tool already, I was surprised to see multiple people shake their head or say “wow” to just how much Qualified could do.

Qualified showed us how the tool helped add personalized content to the chat and brought in a real human at the right moment. Through Qualified’s tight integration with Pardot and added data enrichment from Clearbit, whoever was behind the tool had all the data they needed to make the experience tailored to the prospect- without ever having to ask the prospect for all of this information first.

4 ways Qualified helps build trust

Let’s talk specifics on how Qualified builds prospect trust:

1) Moving beyond text with voice calls

No more waiting for a form fill or sending over a calendar invite. With Qualified, you (or the prospect) can instantly start a voice call or screen share right through the chat window- going from chat to online meeting. Your team is right there the moment they want to talk, helping them get the information they need.

2) Starting conversations at the right time

With Qualified, you can allow the prospect to navigate your website and orient themselves before you initiate a conversation. Not only can your team use their LiveView feature to see exactly where within your website the visitor is, but your team can use Qualified to wait to start the conversation until they’ve navigated specific pages like your products page or pricing guide. 

3) Tailoring your chat to engage your top leads

Nowadays, we all expect communications to be personalized to our online activities. But with Qualified you can not only personalize the experience, but you can also prioritize your chats with top prospects and immediately route them to a real person- giving them the concierge service. What a fantastic way to grow trust and create an engaging brand. 

4) Using data enrichment to tailor your messages

Just like Pardot, Qualified uses GeoIP information to guess the location and even the company the prospect works for. Paired with just a prospect’s email address, you could unlock information on the prospect’s role in the company and company information. All of this data can help your team tailor their messages to speak the language of the prospect and their industry- quickly gaining their trust that you know their industry and could be a valuable asset to their business. 

Building better marketing that earns trust and drives growth 

In 2018, the average marketer has 20+ products in their martech stack. It’s overwhelming to consider owning and managing all of the data and tools at our fingertips. 

And that’s why using a tool like Qualified (or any conversational marketing product) should be a team effort. While one person will need to own it (like any of your marketing tools), it’s meant to help your team get in front of prospects the moment they come to you (or rather, your website). 

You and your team are doing the work to bring in qualified prospects to your site. Now your team can meet them when they arrive, building trust immediately through tailored messaging, personalized content recommendations, and a full stack of online meeting tools. 

What’s your experience with chatbots and conversational marketing? We’d love to learn how you’re using the tool to see growth and build trust.

By |2020-01-20T12:03:39+00:00January 6th, 2020|Categories: Uncategorized|

9 Ethical Marketing Measures You Can Take with Pardot

If you’re sold on ethical marketing and ready to get started, then here’s what you’re looking for. 

I’ve outlined 9 ways you can define your brand and use of Pardot in a more ethical manner.

1. Make sure your privacy policy is on your landing pages

For some businesses, it’s required by law to have and enforce a privacy policy when collecting data.  If you aren’t putting a visible link to your policies (or don’t have them) on your landing pages, you should start here. 

 

2. Don’t buy lists

Yes, of course, you shouldn’t do this. We all know that. But getting your boss or others on board with this idea can be really difficult in some spaces or organizations.

Here are the cut-and-dry points you can make to help you make the case against buying prospect lists:

  • You might be breaking the law (see GDPR, CCPA, or CASL) because those people did *not* give you explicit consent to start emailing them. 
  • You might damage your sender reputation and sender score, meaning you might be marked as a spammer and never see an inbox again.  
  • Your Pardot contract could be ended by Pardot due to violating its Permission Based Marketing Policy. We definitely don’t want that.

Can’t quit cold turkey? Pardot has a couple of alternatives to buying lists that will help wean your team off purchased lists. 

 

3. Learn to love AMPSEA

If you’re not familiar with the term AMPSEA, it stands for “Allowing Multiple Prospects with the Same Email Address.”

It’s the age-old argument of #teamampsea vs. #teamnoampsea. I’m staunchly Team AMPSEA. I know not everyone is, since it can cause messy data.

I’m Team AMPSEA because I believe ethical marketing means allowing your prospects to tell you who they are. I don’t believe ethical marketing happens when we get to decide that. 

AMPSEA not only allows for your prospects to control their preferences more, but it also allows for flexibility. This is really helpful in organizations that are not straight forward B2B (friendly reminder that all types of organizations use Pardot).

Finally, with AMPSEA, Pardot is aligning itself to Salesforce by allowing for multiple records with the same email. Obviously, this isn’t going away. And for other platforms and different types of clients (like nonprofits), this is long overdue. Streamlining platforms will make the work easier, the data better, and hopefully, allow for more Pardot growth.

 

4. Use and stick to your Email Preference Centers

Who doesn’t love transparency?! 

The people trying to hide things. 

Email Preference Centers (EPCs) are a godsend for those who want to create strong ethical marketing practices. The hardest part is not creating them, but sticking to emailing those lists on them.

One of my favorite activities with organizations looking to create ethical marketing processes with Pardot is to overhaul their use of Email Preference Centers. 

I see three main benefits to using them:

  • You’ll set clear expectations for your prospects. By allowing them to see what email lists they are on and why, you can build trust and loyalty. 
  • You’ll set clear expectations for your team. While you might be on board with ethical marketing, you might need more time to understand and practice it. EPCs can help them get started by outlining the lists they should email, rather than the brand new ones they just created.
  • They truly allow your prospects to opt-in and opt-out. EPCs put the power back into the hands of your prospects. Through your proper use of them, prospects can own their consent and you might even find some good insights from this to further personalize and tailor your content. 

With a little extra planning, you can create a strong list of email communications your prospects can expect and easily manage. And a clear set of expectations for your internal team as well. 

 

5. Put the email footer area to good use

My best advice for any email marketer is to use open and honest language to state why someone is getting an email in an email footer. Here’s some copy to get you started:

“You’re receiving this email because…” 

“You joined our lists on MM/DD/YY when you signed up for X”

“Have you been forwarded this email? You can subscribe yourself here.”

Here’s an excellent example (and the replies to this are worth checking out as well.

Credit: https://twitter.com/rutdawson/status/1168436817110216705

 

6. Enable Pardot’s Tracking Opt-In Preferences feature

I see this as the easiest win of the whole list. This feature is that box that pops up asking for you to allow the website to track your activity. 

Without this feature enabled, you are not allowing your prospects to own their data preferences.

I highly recommend you use it, customize it for your company’s tone, and make it honest. 

 

7. Create Accessibility Standards

Roughly 15% of the world’s population live with a disability. Regardless of your stance on ethical marketing, making your digital marketing accessible to all with internet access should be a priority.

The infamous Pardot MVP and CEO of Sercante Andrea Tarrell wrote an excellent post breaking down 8 basic ways you make your content more accessible

 

8. Be mindful with your image files

I’m not telling you to find stock photos that look perfectly balanced with people who visually look diverse. 

I am telling you to try your hardest to be honest and kind with your images. 

  • No jokes at anyone’s expense
  • Keep gifs from flashing too much (and by too much, I mean less than 3 times per second- which can trigger seizures)
  • If you’re going to use stock images to portray your company, make it accurate. I still remember the email I received from a company that used rather diverse stock images, only to notice the company was comprised of all Caucasian men. 

 

9. Consider a double opt-in?

By no means do you have to do this, but if you want to give your prospects the ultimate control of their subscription, consider setting this up. It’s easier on other platforms but you can set this up in Pardot. 

Here’s a more in-depth article on the use cases for it and how to implement double opt-in with Pardot

 

When in doubt: communicate honestly

Not ready? Getting push back? Feeling overwhelmed?

Let’s take a step back and just think about how you can make small changes to make your communication with your prospects more transparent and honest.

 

More resources for creating your own ethical marketing standards

If you’re interested in this, I encourage you to learn more and form your own practices. Here are three digital resources you should check out. 

  • B the Change– the official blog of B Lab, who runs the B Corporation movement
  • Better Allies– run by Karen Catlin, an advocate for inclusivity, her newsletter and resources have expanded my marketing quite a bit. 
  • Business Ethics Highlight– highlighting the good and the bad, this news sources rounds up the latest in ethics and business.
By |2021-08-25T11:01:19+00:00December 16th, 2019|Categories: Uncategorized|

A Case for Creating Your Own Ethical Marketing Standards with Pardot

This is a question that motivates me:

How does your company make the world a better place through technology?

Asking this question is what lead me to start or join in on the philanthropic efforts at all of my previous employers. It’s led me to push hard for previous employers to adopt ethical marketing standards with their marketing automation. And it’s a conversation I regularly have with my Salesforce and Pardot clients.

To me, it’s a necessary question to ask before I launch any new marketing campaign. 

Ethical Marketing is my Driving Force: Could it be Yours?

Ethical marketing motives all that I do with marketing and marketing automation, like Pardot. It’s a reason I tweet, read, and give talks about ethical marketing for all kinds of organizations. As a consultant, and previously a Pardot admin, I’ve used this do-gooder lens to drive my decisions and better advise my clients. 

I believe ethical marketing is not just a way of the future or a passing trend. Ethical marketing is now a standard that many consumers look for when making a purchase. 

Whether they are marketers making a platform investment or a customer making a purchase — knowing that a company is going to take care of our data will drive us towards one company over another. 

So, What is “Ethical Marketing”?

..and how does this apply to Pardot, a B2B platform that’s pretty neutral?

I define ethical marketing as marketing that inherently tries to be good, just, and honest with their efforts while addressing their business’s needs. 

It’s a shift from solely helping your Sales team win, to honoring your prospect’s data while winning. 

First, let’s acknowledge this is tricky stuff. It can certainly be a grey area. And it’s different for every person and organization based on their values, use cases, and so many more factors. But this is where you and/or your organization can take a stance to make the world a better place. 

I really like this paragraph defining what ethical marketing is, from Dan Shewan,

“To put this another way, ethical marketing isn’t a strategy; it’s a philosophy. It includes everything from ensuring advertisements are honest and trustworthy, to building strong relationships with consumers through a set of shared values. Companies with a focus on ethical marketing evaluate their decisions from a business perspective (i.e. whether a particular marketing initiative will deliver the desired return) as well as a moral perspective (i.e. whether a decision is “right” or morally sound).”

What Does Salesforce Say About Ethical Marketing?

“We know that technology is not inherently good or bad; it’s what we do with it that matters. And that’s why we’re making the ethical and humane use of technology a strategic focus at Salesforce.” -MARC BENIOFF, CHAIRMAN AND CO-CEO, SALESFORCE

While I see Salesforce as putting the ball back in the court of their customers (rightfully so) to use their technology for good, they are also giving them the tools to do better through many of the best practices they teach on Trailhead.

Their actions and investments also speak volumes. You can see where their head is at through their formation departments like the Office of Ethical and Humane Use and the Office of Equality.

They speak a lot about “inclusive marketing”. I see ethical marketing and inclusive marketing as two different but highly aligned initiatives. 

Before I dive into how you can implement ethical marketing into your Salesforce and Pardot instances, let me introduce you to something I’ve read and shared a lot- a wonderful blog post on inclusive marketing written by Alexandra Legend Siegel, Head of Equality Content & Narrative at Salesforce. 

Ok, but Why Should I Consider Ethical Marketing?

Let’s start with this infographic from a Salesforce research survey from October 2018 that surveyed over 2000 American consumers:

Credit: https://www.salesforce.com/company/ethical-and-humane-use/

To me, the stat that speaks the most to the benefits of practicing ethical marketing is:

“69% of consumers say they spend more money with companies who demonstrate good ethics.”

It’s a simple equation of be good + do good = do more business. 

And to take this one step further, from that same survey 86% of consumers say they are more loyal to companies who demonstrate good ethics. 

Not only will ethical marketing help you earn more paying customers, but it can also help you earn their loyalty so they continue to be a paying customer. 

Want to learn more about putting this into action for your business?  Email me at [email protected] or subscribe to this blog at the bottom of the page — we’ll be posting several other blogs on this topic, including practical tips to get started.

By |2019-12-02T06:54:47+00:00December 2nd, 2019|Categories: Uncategorized|