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Must-Have Salesforce Marketing Cloud Extensions, Apps, and Add-Ons

Marketing Cloud Engagement is a great tool and it offers a wide range of functionality and various capabilities. But, as with all software, there are always limitations that leave you wanting more. That’s where Marketing Cloud extensions become essential.

Thanks to the strong Salesforce ecosystem, the openness of the platform, and the love it receives from its customers, users, and enthusiasts, there are so many extensions, apps, and add-ons that can help enhance your Marketing Cloud experience.

Listed below are some of my favorites from my seven years of working with Salesforce Marketing Cloud (SFMC).

Top Marketing Cloud Extensions

SFMC Companion

This Chrome Extension is a fond favorite of mine and it is particularly useful for those “busy” Marketing Cloud accounts and for anyone who spends hours down rabbit holes trying to understand whether a particular Data Extension is still being used, or is even still relevant.

SFMC Companion offers a useful search functionality that allows you to look for any asset or object using a free-text search field. Furthermore, whilst on any SFMC asset or object, the ‘Inspect’ tool will show all components referencing or using that particular asset or object.

Thanks to SFMC Companion there is no longer a need to have several tabs open simultaneously just to understand whether a Data Extension can be deleted.

Evergage Launcher

This might technically be cheating as it’s practically a necessity for implementing Marketing Cloud Personalization but I’ve always enjoyed using it.

This extension helps identify whether the Marketing Cloud Personalization (MCP) SDK has been added to the website, so you no longer need to pester your IT team, and it is also where you can launch the Visual Editor.

The Visual Editor is by far the easiest way to build your JS Sitemap, which is a huge part of any MCP implementation. Users also have the ability to see their work whilst on the page – this comes in handy when creating personalization campaigns, another feature accessible via the Evergage Launcher.

Salesforce Inspector

Whilst this is not specifically related to SFMC, it is worth installing. Most SFMC accounts use Salesforce CRM data (it’s very rare not to have Marketing Cloud Connect).

Therefore, with such a reliance on Core Salesforce data, this extension can save you a lot of time. If you quickly need to check the API field names or the field type, or even example values, Salesforce Inspector is your tool.

Furthermore, Salesforce Inspector lets you easily import and export data which is incredibly useful if you need to prepare test data for UAT.

Top Marketing Cloud Apps

It’s worth mentioning that for the following section, I’ve loosely used the term “Apps” as it covers everything from App Exchange products to Mobile Apps.

Query Studio

Perhaps one of Marketing Cloud’s best-kept secrets, but Query Studio is an incredibly useful app to add to your SFMC instance. If you’ve ever wanted to test your SQL skills without having to create an automation, then this might be for you.

Query Studio allows you to quickly build queries in the Marketing Cloud without needing to create and configure an automation. Once you’re happy with your selection, Query Studio can use your query to create Data Extensions automatically.

Marketing Cloud Mobile App

Ever needed to quickly track email performance or to check that you definitely paused that Journey, but you don’t have access to your laptop? The Marketing Cloud Mobile App might just be able to help.

However, whilst it’s useful to have instant access to your SFMC account with just your phone, it is worth pointing out that there are some SFMC features that are not available in the mobile App, so don’t throw away the laptop just yet.

You can find the app in both the Google Play Store and Apple Store.

SiteCore

Technically two for the price of one as there is both a Web CMS app and a DAM app but they’ll both help bolster your SFMC instance with the world-leading CMS. Although, it is probably worth pointing out that these apps are far from cheap.

If, however, you’re lucky enough to have one of these licenses, you can drag-and-drop approved SiteCore assets directly from the SFMC Email Editor. Alternatively, you can send contact data and behavior back to your Sitecore Experience Database to close the loop on asset performance.

DESelect Segment

Full disclosure, I’ve never had the pleasure of working with this particular app but I had to include it as it solves, what I think, is one of the biggest issues SFMC clients face when procuring SFMC… segmentation. DESelect brings drag-and-drop segmentation to Marketing Cloud and reduces the need for marketing teams to have SQL knowledge.

Again, it’s worth pointing out that whilst there is a free version available you will have to pay to increase usage, users and features (i.e., saturation control and deduplication). However, depending on your team’s skillset this app could well be worth considering.

Bonus Content

If the technical skills aren’t your team’s forte and AMPscript is constantly causing you trouble, check out ampscript.io, a useful tool that helps validate AMPscript code and highlights any AMPscript that may result in potential syntax errors.

Get more details about AMPscript in this blog post from Kayla Border.

Top Marketing Cloud Add-Ons

SalesWings

Ever needed Lead Scoring in SFMC? Say hello to SalesWings! This add-on is easy to install and is a highly cost-effective way of plugging the SFMC Lead Scoring hole.

SalesWings tracks website activity and couples it with data from CRM before scoring and grading customers using a flexible scoring model. SalesWings data can be shared with Salesforce CRM as well as used in future SFMC segmentation.

Litmus

If you’re lucky enough to have both a Litmus and SFMC account, then you should definitely consider integrating the two. Yes, SFMC allows you to preview emails, but with an integrated Litmus account, you get so much more.

With an integrated account you can sync emails from the Litmus builder to SFMC or build in SFMC and test as you go. You can test dynamic content and individual personalization with the integrated email previews and, perhaps most impressively, share email performance with Litmus to create a single view of performance.

Use Marketing Cloud extensions to make the most of the platform

Going back to my previous comment, all software products have their limitations, but it is Salesforce’s ecosystem that has encouraged enthusiasts to build upon its offerings which, as shown above, has led to some innovative solutions that could give your SFMC instance that much-needed capability boost.

So if you’ve been contemplating if the grass is greener on the other side it could be worth exploring the depths of the Salesforce Community — chances are there is already a solution to your problem out there.

Original article: Must-Have Salesforce Marketing Cloud Extensions, Apps, and Add-Ons

The post Must-Have Salesforce Marketing Cloud Extensions, Apps, and Add-Ons appeared first on The Spot.

By Ralph Green|2023-11-22T14:58:38+00:00November 22nd, 2023|Categories: API & Integration, Marketing Cloud, Pro Tips, revive|

In the beautiful sunshine and chill vibes of Clearwater Beach, FL, Salesforce community members of all kinds came together recently for Florida Dreamin’. The Dreamin’ events are community-led Salesforce conferences around the globe each with their personality. Florida Dreamin’ specifically strives to, “provide inspiration, coaching, and guidance on how to truly blaze your own trail.”

This comes from a perceived, “gap in Salesforce education when it comes to career pathing and guidance.” From my experience as a first-time attendee, this conference lives up to its vision by serving up an abundance of project management/team dynamics & soft-skill content.

Of the 44 sessions on offer, over half had a non-technical focus with topics spanning from career path advice and how to negotiate like a pro to advice on building diagrams and running demos that are informative and effective.

Some Soft-Skill Session Highlights

I attended many wonderful sessions across a variety of technical and non-technical topics, but wanted to highlight three soft-skill sessions in particular. Two of them I found especially illuminating and will be taking tips and tricks back to my consulting work and the third one is my speaking session, which I certainly hope provided impactful guidance to those in attendance.

5 Critical Change Management Steps for Successful Adoption

In this session, Paula Cervoni and Stacey Chery of Silverline emphasized the importance of dedicated and continual change management throughout the lifecycle of a project and into the training and adoption phase. Good change management helps get to the end goal of successful happy users which is what we all want! The change management steps Paula and Stacey outlined are:

Alignment – to the vision and mission of the project with engagement from Stakeholders, SMEs, Executive Team Members, and end users
Communication – a concerted strategy and communication plan to keep users informed every step of the way,
Training – curated applicable training paths for each user group/business role using real-world examples when possible to demonstrate utility,
Reinforcement – making sure that users are actively supported and know exactly who to go to when they have issues at go-live,
Measurement – getting some data behind adoption and success with both formal and informal measurement methods

With these steps, you too can change manage with the best of them and help your projects succeed, not just from a technical perspective, but from an adoption and satisfaction perspective as well.

The Surviving & Thriving Handbook for Accidental Admins

I was honored to give my first-ever Salesforce speaking session at Florida Dreamin’ and am especially happy to be able to join in on the soft-skills theme. My session highlighted my journey into accidental adminship* at a nonprofit organization and the struggles I faced trying to be successful in my day-to-day job as well as my Salesforce Admin duties.

To help bring myself from surviving to thriving, I enacted a number of actionable processes which streamlined my responsibilities, set expectations for my end users, and increased buy-in and end-user satisfaction.

Suggested steps for others facing accidental adminship included:

Establishing 2x yearly full organization Salesforce expectations and communication meetings
Offering regularly scheduled office hours to your end users
Identifying and leveraging your super users to be your champions, beta testers, and day-to-day support for other users in their departments
Setting up a Salesforce Request queue process to allow the Admin to triage, manage, and systematically work through end-user needs and issues
Bringing in a trusted partner, such as Sercante, for support

If this sounds like a topic you could use some support on please reach out to Sercante! We are here to help ease your Admin burden.

* An Accidental Admin is, “someone who had not considered a career in Salesforce until some event brought Salesforce into their work life and who juggles Salesforce admin responsibilities in addition to their regular job” – Source: Salesforce Ben

Just a Demo? Never! Always Demo Like a Pro

Jennifer Kinstle, Principal Architect at Zennify, gave a super practical guide on how to demo like a pro. She highlighted three key steps to a successful demo which ultimately can lead to increased adoption and project success.

Her recipe for a great demo is the following:

1. Know the business – Understand the specific audience you will be demoing to. Tailor your demo to the language and topics that will be most understood and valued by the demo audience.

2. Tell the story – A good demo has a beginning, middle, and end and works with an applicable business use case. Jennifer suggested always “share the why” – making it clear to your audience why the demo is important to them and their business.

3. Prepare & practice – This includes preparing your space, both physical and digital to ensure there are no unexpected interruptions… error messages or chat messages, and the like.

Jennifer also advises tailoring your demo script to what you need. If you need a full line-by-line script, do that, if you do better with bulleted talking points, then go for it. She also highlighted the importance of the run-through, do the demo exactly as you would for the demo audience in the environment where you will be doing the final demo. This is a critical step to mitigate unexpected errors or bugs so you can fix them before show time.

Following the tips in this session, I feel like I will be able to improve the utility of my demos for my clients.

Florida Dreamin’ for the Win!

Florida Dreamin’ was a wonderful conference experience and a great place to give my first ever speaking session. The manageable size of the conference, beautiful location, and focus on soft skills and the Ohana spirit make this an ideal conference for everyone from the seasoned pro to the brand new trailblazer.

Gorgeous ocean sunsets and delicious tiki drinks aside, this conference has a strong sense of community and inclusion with loads of meetups (including a nonprofit lunch meetup that I attended) and excursions. Folks were there to learn a lot, network, and have a fun time doing it, and I don’t think you can ask for much more out of a Dreamin’ event.

Be sure to check out these other posts from my fellow dragons who attended Florida Dreamin’ with me and shared details about their favorite sessions there.

The Art of Delivering Empathetic and Joyful User Experiences | Catherine Williams

How to Write like a Marketer: Intro to AMPscript for Salesforce Marketing Cloud | Kayla Border

Original article: Florida Dreamin’: A Conference Where Soft Skills Shine

The post Florida Dreamin’: A Conference Where Soft Skills Shine appeared first on The Spot.

By Abbey Freund|2023-11-18T16:04:42+00:00November 18th, 2023|Categories: Career Development, Community, Events, Real Talk, revive|

Recently I was perusing the Salesforce IdeaExchange for interesting features to upvote and came across a common issue with over 4k upvotes, “Automate contact owner update when account owner changes.”

Now, I would LOVE for this to be a native Salesforce feature of course, but there is a simple solution to this that I couldn’t find documented anywhere.

So let’s get to it!

The problem with Account and Contact Owner mismatches

Depending on how your sales team manages Account and Contacts, Account and Contact Owner mismatches can cause a lot of headaches.

In most Salesforce orgs I’ve worked with, the Account Owner is responsible for nurturing all Contacts within the Account, but if Sales Rep A owns the Account and Sales Rep B owns half of the Contacts under the Account it can cause issues.

Those issues include:

Sales Rep A missing Contacts when viewing reports
Account Engagement “Create Salesforce Task” completion actions get assigned to the wrong user
Contact Activities get missed by the Salesperson who needs to act on them
Multiple Sales reps nurturing the same Contact at the same time

To solve for this common issue we’re going to build two items:

Formula Field on the Contact
Schedule-Triggered Flow for Contacts

Identify Owner Mismatches

The first step is identifying records with an Account and Contact Owner mismatch. To do so, we want to build a Formula Checkbox field.

Navigate to Setup > Object Manager > Contact > Fields & Relationships
Select New
Choose Formula, then Next
Name the field “Owner Mismatch”
Select Checkbox, then Next
For the Formula, enter “IF((Account.OwnerId = OwnerId), FALSE,TRUE)”
- If you are not familiar with Salesforce formulas, what this essentially says is if the Account Owner’s ID equals the Contact Owner’s ID the checkbox should be False, or unchecked. If the two Owner IDs do not match, the checkbox should be True, or checked.
Enter an Description so other users know what this field is for, and select Next
Select the users who should have access to this field and the page layouts you’d like the fields added to, then select Save

Automatically Update Contact Owners

Next, we’ll create a flow to automatically update your Contact Owner to match your Account Owner. This flow is very simple, so don’t abandon ship if you are not yet a Flow super user!

Navigate to Setup > Flows
Select New Flow
Select Schedule-Triggered Flow
Fill in the “Set a Schedule” details as below
- Start Date: Today’s date
- Start Time: I recommend you set this flow to run outside of business hours. For my flow, I chose 12:00 AM
- Frequency: Daily

Next, select + Choose Object
Fill in the Configure Start details outlined below
Select Contact
Enter the condition as below
- Field: Owner_Mismatch__c
- Operator: Equals
- Value: True

Under your Start element, select the plus symbol to add a new element
Select Update Records
Label the Element “Update Contact Owner”
Under “Set Field Values for the Contact Record” set the Field to OwnerID and set the Value to {!$Record.Account.OwnerId}

Select Done
Select Save from the top right hand corner and name your Flow “Contact – Update Owner to Match Account”

Select Save
Finally, Debug your Flow to ensure it works as expected, then Activate it!

Now sit back and let everyone marvel at how clean Account and Contact owners are in the org.

Get more solutions like this from Sercante

Need help figuring it all out? Reach out to the team at Sercante to get a conversation going.

Original article: Automatically Update Contact Owners to Match Account Owners in Salesforce

The post Automatically Update Contact Owners to Match Account Owners in Salesforce appeared first on The Spot.

By Erin Duncan|2023-11-14T16:48:18+00:00November 14th, 2023|Categories: Data Management, Marketing Automations, Pro Tips, revive|

The 2023 MarDreamies Awards inspired the marketing community and wowed the judges as they announced this year’s winners at the fourth MarDreamin’ conference that took place from October 31 to November 3.

The MarDreamies presented five award winners in addition to some honorable mentions across the award categories as each team was featured for their innovative solution implemented with Salesforce marketing tools.

MarDreamies Award Categories: A quick recap

If you remember from previous years, the MarDreamies categories include Personalization Perfection, Social Impact, Grassroots Innovation, Extending Salesforce, and Best in Show.

Personalization Perfection: Right-time, right-message marketing
Social Impact: Creating positive change through Salesforce
Grassroots Innovation: Scaling small business with Salesforce
Extending Salesforce: API and AI-driven solutions
Best in Show: Best all-around solution

Marketing teams submitted their entries selecting which category they wanted to be recognized for and shared the goal they worked to achieve, the details of the solution, and the results post implementation. There were many great submissions this year which made the selection process for the judges very challenging, but after much consideration, they were able to narrow it down to one winner per category.

And the MarDreamies 2023 Award Winners Are…

On November 2, 2023, the MarDreamies presenters who included Marcos Duran, Chris Zullo, Bill Fetter, Julie Rasco, and Jen Kazin announced the award winners.

Personalization Perfection: Grupo Xcaret
Social Impact: Veterans Guardian
Grassroots Innovation: TSI Incorporated
Extending Salesforce: Cypress Learning Solutions
Best in Show: Close Brothers Asset Finance and Leasing

Watch the session on demand to relive the MarDreamies experience and get all the details!

2023 MarDreamies Award Personalization Perfection Category Winner: Grupo Xcaret

Grupo Xcaret submitted the solution, Personalized Shopping Cart Coupon at the Last Step of the Purchase, to win the MarDreamies 2023 award for the Personalization Perfection category, which celebrates teams for delivering right-time, right message marketing.

The Grupo Xcaret team shared more about their solution in the below video that was featured during the MarDreamies session.

What does Grupo Xcaret do?

In the travel and hospitality industry, Grupo Xcaret is on a mission to make the planet happier by sharing their love of Mexico. Putting on amazing shows and breathtaking attractions across their parks, tours, and hotels, they aim to create “unique, magical, and memorable experiences” for their guests and visitors.

How does Grupo Xcaret use Salesforce tools to create personalized experiences?

The team noticed that customers would start the purchase process for their parks and tours, but would get to the last step of the purchase, see the final price, and then abandon their cart.

To encourage more customers to complete their purchase, Grupo Xcaret used Salesforce Marketing Cloud Personalization to create trackable and customized coupons for each of their products in English and Spanish. They configured this solution with the website so it would display the correct coupon for the purchase after time has passed and the purchase has not been completed.

The solution required the cooperation of their web team, marketing automation team, and a third-party team to create the configurations necessary for successful execution. Their hard work paid off as the solution contributed to increasing their revenue by 77% and improved the conversion rate on the last step of the purchase process by 55%.

Grupo Xcaret’s solution is a great example to the marketing community of what can be achieved when we use Salesforce marketing tools to deliver personalized experiences. If you have been inspired by their solution, be sure to give Grupo Xcaret a shout-out on social media!

2023 MarDreamies Award Grassroots Innovation Category Winner: TSI Incorporated

TSI Incorporated submitted the solution, Optimizing The Lead Management Process to Better Serve Prospects & Customers, to win the MarDreamies 2023 award for the Grassroots Innovation category, which recognizes teams for using Salesforce marketing tools to scale their businesses.

What does TSI Incorporated do?

Serving a global market, TSI Incorporated engineers and manufactures measurement instruments to help make the job easier for aerosol science, and evaluating air flow, indoor air quality, fluid dynamics, and biohazard detection.

Founded in 1961 with headquarters based in the U.S. and field offices across Europe and Asia, TSI has grown as a large organization and established a worldwide presence in the markets they serve.

How does TSI Incorporated use Salesforce tools to scale their business?

The TSI team wanted to make sure that their lead handover process was streamlined so qualified leads could be routed to the right salesperson quickly for a timely response to prospects and to prevent deals from falling through the cracks.

They set out to build a completely new sales user experience. Their custom ‘Sales Inquiries’ object, which is what sales was using to take action on product inquiries, was reconfigured to provide a single interface to track the next step when interest is expressed in one of their products. The team used Salesforce Flows to execute the automations needed to handle inquiries and processing, which are all triggered from a Marketing Cloud Account Engagement form submission.

TSI’s SAP system contained their territory assignment and routing rules. They designed and refactored all the automations that were happening between their SAP system and Salesforce that handled the sales inquiry creation and processing.

As a result of refactoring and redesigning the automation between the SAP system and Salesforce and creating a streamlined sales user interface with the Sales Inquiry object, sales’ ability to act on the right leads at the right time increased by 35%!

TSI’s solution is a great example to the community of what’s possible when we leverage the foundational functionality of the Salesforce platform. If you have been inspired by their solution, be sure to give TSI Incorporated a shout-out on social media!

2023 MarDreamies Award Extending Salesforce Category Winner: Cypress Learning Solutions

Cypress Learning Solutions submitted the solution, Reply Intelligence, to win the MarDreamies 2023 award for the Extending Salesforce category which highlights teams for creating API and AI-driven solutions. Brandon Walton, the president, owner & principal consultant of Cypress Learning Solutions, shared more about Reply Intelligence in the below video that was featured during the MarDreamies session.

What does Cypress Learning Solutions do?

Cypress Learning Solutions is a Salesforce implementation and training solutions provider, designing customized workshops and implementation services for organizations transitioning to Salesforce and Marketing Cloud Account Engagement.

Tell me more about Reply Intelligence…

Reply Intelligence is an AI & algorithmic solution that gives marketers greater insight into the replies to marketing and inbound emails and allows them to trigger automations from them.

It has become increasingly more difficult for marketers to rely on clicks and open rates to track engagement, and at the same time, their “reply-to” inboxes become filled with the marketing email Out of Office replies and other autoresponders.

Reply Intelligence is an email integration solution that helps marketers to better manage the reply-to inboxes and trigger Marketing Cloud Account Engagement Completion Actions from inbound emails and email replies. The solution was developed from integrating several technical components including ESPs, Salesforce, the development of Cypress Learning Solutions’ internal Large Language Model (LLM), and connections into AI platforms.

Brandon Walton added, “We have processed > 1mm email replies and are continuously evolving our LLM to detect intent from emails, including purchasing intent and requests to be removed/unsubscribed from databases.”

Cypress Learning Solutions’ Reply Intelligence is a great example of innovation from an API and AI-driven solution. If you have been inspired by their story, be sure to give Cypress Learning Solutions a shout-out on social media!

2023 MarDreamies Award Social Impact Category Winner: Veterans Guardian

Veterans Guardian submitted the solution, Successfully Segmenting an Audience, to win the MarDreamies 2023 award for the Social Impact category, which honors teams for creating positive change with Salesforce tools. Avery McKenzie, marketing coordinator at Veterans Guardian, shared more about the solution in the below video that was featured during the MarDreamies session.

What does Veterans Guardian do?

Veterans Guardian, is a private consulting company partnering with veterans to help them attain the VA benefits they have earned from their honorable service to the nation. The veterans disability claim process can be complicated and overwhelming, which is where Veterans Guardian comes in. They support veterans through the claims process helping them build their claim strategy and providing education and information needed to help them get the benefits they are entitled to.

How does Veterans Guardian use Salesforce for social impact?

As Veterans Guardian supports veterans through the disability claims process, it is critical that their communication is delivered to the right person at the right time. Their team wanted to advance how they engage veterans with personalized communication to provide them with the best experience possible.

The Veterans Guardian team evaluated their audience segmentation in conjunction with their customer experience process and came up with 74 Marketing Cloud journeys. Using features such as Einstein Send Time Optimization, decision splits, and Salesforce Flows to trigger the journeys, Veterans Guardian was able to create customized communication for each veteran based on where they were in their process. As a result, Veterans Guardian experienced improved engagement results and client satisfaction.

Through Veterans Guardian’s dedication to delivering the best client experience for veterans with personalized communication through Salesforce marketing tools, they have been able to create positive change. If you have been inspired by their solution, be sure to give Veterans Guardian a shout-out on social media!

2023 MarDreamies Award Best in Show Category Winner: Close Brothers Asset Finance and Leasing

Close Brothers Asset Finance and Leasing submitted the solution, Salesforce Digital Customer Cycle, to win the MarDreamies 2023 award for the Best in Show category, which recognizes teams for building the best all-around solution. Jonathan Dytor, Head of Digital Marketing at Close Brothers Asset Finance and Leasing, shared more about the solution in the below video that was featured during the MarDreamies session.

What does Close Brothers Asset Finance and Leasing do?

A member of the Close Brothers Group, Close Brothers Asset Finance and Leasing is a UK-based company founded in 1987 that provides finance for businesses offering practical solutions that empower them for success.

Tell me more about the Salesforce Digital Customer Cycle solution…

The Close Brothers Asset Finance and Leasing team constructed a complete digital customer journey within their Salesforce Org. To execute this, they rebuilt their seven websites and portal using Experience Cloud, Marketing Cloud Account Engagement, Sales Cloud, and Analytics Studio.

The breakdown of the solution from their submission is included below:

Experience Builder – Used to rebuild the websites and the Portal
Account Engagement – Captures UTM parameters for all Leads
Sales Cloud – Auto-manages Lead assignment rules and tracks Opportunities
Analytics Studio – Tracks real-time ROI

Their team was using a third party for website development and was not getting the functionality and insights they desired from their websites. They wanted to have full autonomy over their digital platforms and researched what they could do if they were to rebuild them with Experience Builder. They also evaluated how they could use Marketing Cloud Account Engagement to trigger automated communications to customers at critical points throughout their journey.

They decided to move forward, and in just one month they launched three of the seven sites and built the other four and their customer portal, all completed in house. Their team now has full control over their websites and their customer portal. Close Brothers Asset Finance and Leasing can get the insights they need from their digital platforms without any reliance on third parties and they can build new sites all in house with extreme speed!

Close Brothers Asset Finance and Leasing creating the Salesforce Digital Customer Cycle is a great example of the creative solutions that can be built on the Salesforce platform to achieve business goals. If you have been inspired by their story, be sure to give Close Brothers Asset Finance and Leasing a shout-out on social media!

2023 MarDreamies Award Honorable Mentions

There were so many outstanding solutions submitted for the 2023 MarDreamies Awards that it made the selection process very challenging. As the award presenters expressed during the session, they did not want to conclude it without giving a few honorable mentions to the following teams that shared some incredible solutions!

The Brain Tumour Charity: Inspires Optimized Donations, Customer Journeys with DESelect Engage
AdventHealth: Leveraging Real-time Data to Power Next Best Actions
Cezium: Tik Tok Adz for Marketing Cloud
California Association of Realtors: Localized Housing Market Data
J.R. Simplot Company: Welcome Series to Engaged Audience
Hilton Supply Management: Making the Connection

Get more ideas to bring back to your team

The MarDreamies 2023 awards are a great way to be in the know about the latest innovations that are being developed in the marketing community. If any of these award winner stories have sparked an idea, we encourage you to share it with your team to see what new advancement you can create next to achieve your goals.

In addition to the MarDreamies, there were so many amazing creative solutions presented at the MarDreamin conference this year. To learn and get more ideas to bring back to your team, watch the sessions on demand!

Original article: MarDreamin’ Recap: MarDreamies 2023 Award Winners

The post MarDreamin’ Recap: MarDreamies 2023 Award Winners appeared first on The Spot.

By Christina Anderson|2023-11-10T16:13:42+00:00November 10th, 2023|Categories: Community, Community Spotlight, Events, revive|

Living in a fast-paced world of technology, it’s easy to get caught up in the whirlwind of innovation and lose sight of the human element. We can occasionally prioritize the tools and systems we use over the people who rely on them.

Insights from Daniel Gorton’s Florida Dreamin’ Presentation

Daniel Gorton, a Salesforce architect with a unique background in social work and psychology, recently delivered a thought-provoking presentation at Florida Dreamin’ that reminded us of the importance of centering people within our technology discussions.

Here are the insights he shared.

Asking The Right Questions

Gorton, who defines himself as an “empathetic and multi-centered Salesforce architect,” captivated the audience with his perspective at the intersection of technology and social work. He posed essential questions that challenge our approach to change and user experiences, asking, “What are some ways we can be inclusive and intentional with change?” and “How do we make sure everyone has their needs met?”

Consider Learning Styles and Needs

One of the key takeaways from his presentation was the emphasis on inclusivity, considering diverse learning styles and needs. Gorton reminded us that individuals have varying comfort and experience levels with technology. This message couldn’t be more relevant as we continue to integrate artificial intelligence into our daily lives. In a separate presentation during Florida Dreamin where the A.I. Lay’s campaign “Messi Messages” came up and an audience member asked, “Just because we can, does it mean we should?” which reflects the unease many feel when confronted with different and evolving types of technology.

Change management was also a focus of Gorton’s presentation. He stressed the importance of not just looking at systems but also focusing on the people behind it — those who build, test, approve, and use it. Gorton encouraged us to add value and create experiences that anticipate users’ needs, ultimately leading to joy and delight. He reminded us that even small gestures, like adding emojis, can brighten someone’s mood. Additionally, he underlined the fact that users teach us valuable lessons in the process.

Where Empathy and Strategy Meet

Combining our empathetic sides with strategic approaches, such as focus groups, road mapping, and well-defined processes, can help bridge the gap between technology, those who work in it, and the end users.

Gorton urged the audience to “consider organizational context, system performance, & Salesforce well-architected best practices.” He provided several examples of how Sales Cloud does this today, citing Path as one of the easiest-to-offer UI features.

Gorton also provided insights into best practices for training, emphasizing the importance of feedback and requests, encouraging feedback loops, and breaking down silos. He encouraged us not to be afraid to iterate and build slowly, ensuring that we can fine-tune our solutions over time.

Finally, Daniel Gorton’s presentation was a reminder that technology should enhance human experiences, not overshadow them. By being more inclusive, empathetic, and thoughtful in our approach, we can create solutions that bring not only use but also delight users. Let’s reflect on Gorton’s insights and let them serve as a valuable guide for how each of us can navigate through the intersection of technology and the people behind those systems.

Original article: The Art of Delivering Empathetic and Joyful User Experiences

The post The Art of Delivering Empathetic and Joyful User Experiences appeared first on The Spot.

By Catherine Williams|2023-11-02T14:23:48+00:00November 2nd, 2023|Categories: Community, Community Spotlight, Events, Real Talk, revive|

If you’re new to Marketing Cloud Engagement, you may be feeling overwhelmed. Salesforce’s powerful marketing platform can do a lot. And that comes with a steep learning curve.

I’ve been on my Marketing Cloud Engagement journey for a while now and still feel the sense of having so much to learn. My learning journey has consisted of hands-on experience, boot camp-style training courses, and of course, all the Trailheads.

Florida Dreamin’ Session – How to Write like a Marketer: Intro to AMPscript for Salesforce Marketing Cloud

I knew when I was given the opportunity to attend this year’s Florida Dreamin’, finding Marketing Cloud Engagement sessions was at the top of my event bucket list. That’s why I was super excited to attend Tatiana Romanko’s presentation, How to Write like a Marketer: Intro to AMPscript for Salesforce Marketing Cloud.

Romanko took a complex topic and simplified it, making her content easy to understand by providing real-world use cases every marketer could relate to. This session was a great introduction to AMPSprcipt for Marketing Cloud Engagement users who are still on that learning curve, and even seasoned veterans took away a thing or two.

What I especially loved about her session is that, like me, Romanko doesn’t have a coding background. Her message really resonated with me: with hard work and hands-on experience, you too can learn the technical intricacies of Salesforce Marketing Cloud.

What is AMPScript?

Before jumping right into a complex topic, Romanko set the stage with a quick introduction to AMPscript. “AMPscript is Marketing Cloud’s proprietary scripting language for advanced dynamic content in emails, landing pages, SMS, and push messages.”

“AMPscript expands Marketing Cloud functionality to help you create the one-to-one, personalized communications that are so coveted by digital marketers. https://trailhead.salesforce.com/content/learn/modules/ampscript-for-nondevelopers/get-to-know-ampscript)

AMPscript is used to:

Personalize emails using subscriber or contact data.
Create complex, highly dynamic emails using conditional logic.
Clean and format data.
Add real-time information to emails such as date or time.
Track impressions.”

(source: https://trailhead.salesforce.com/content/learn/modules/ampscript-for-nondevelopers/get-to-know-ampscript)

What is AMPScript used for in Marketing Cloud Engagement?

AMPScript does a lot. At Sercante, we use it to help our clients with personalizing their emails, creating dynamic content, and much more. What I liked about Romanko’s session is that she really honed in on three common use cases that every marketer can relate to.

Personalization

If you’re a marketer, you already know the power of personalization. One study found that emails featuring personalized subjects are 50% more likely to be opened. AMPScript in Marketing Cloud Engagement allows you to use your subscriber data to personalize your marketing.

Creating a personalized greeting in Marketing Cloud Engagement through a personalization string isn’t complicated. What I liked about Romanko’s use case is she focused on something I often times see clients overlook: what happens when you don’t have a subscriber’s first name? In this case, we could use AMPscript to set a generic value (Customer) as our greeting if we don’t have this data.

Formatting Your Data

As a marketer, I’ve seen customers input their data in every way imaginable. Romanko gave the example of asking someone to provide their favorite color. In this instance, we could get a few different variations:

Pink
pink
PINK

So what happens when we go to pull this data into an email? It could end up looking like we either don’t know our basic grammar, or come across like we are YELLING at our reader.

Romanko highlighted AMPScript’s ProperCase function here, “which capitalizes the first letter in the specified string and any other letters in the string that follow any character other than a letter. It converts all other letters into lowercase.”

AMPScript Resources

As you can see, Romanko gave some great use cases for using AMPScript. She also provided her audience with some really great resources on where to go to learn more:

Original article: How to Write like a Marketer: Intro to AMPscript for Salesforce Marketing Cloud

The post How to Write like a Marketer: Intro to AMPscript for Salesforce Marketing Cloud appeared first on The Spot.

By Kayla Border|2023-11-01T15:13:58+00:00November 1st, 2023|Categories: Emails & Forms, Events, Marketing Automations, Marketing Cloud, Pro Tips, revive|

One of the biggest trouble spots I see with customers customizing in CRM Analytics and B2B Marketing Analytics (B2BMA) is using recipes and joins — specifically when it comes to the Account Engagement customizable Campaign Influence model.

Recently, a customer and I were diving into their Campaign Influence Model, and the numbers were just not right. They had done a great job of knowing what objects to select in the recipe. On the surface, everything looked great, but once they started reviewing the data in a lens they saw a lot of data discrepancy. This type of recipe can get tricky if you aren’t aware of some of the nuances of CRM Analytics.

In this blog, I want to walk you through step by step so you can build your custom recipe in B2BMA utilizing Campaign Influence and feel confident about the data you have on your CRM Analytics dashboards.

What is Campaign Influence?

Now I don’t want to go on a diatribe on Campaign Influence. Chances are if you are reading this, you are already aware of it and how great it is. But on the off chance you just stumbled upon this blog, I will give you a brief overview.

Quite frankly, besides CRM Analytics, Account Engagement influence models and Campaign Influence are my favorite Salesforce reporting features. Account Engagement Campaign Influence models are a way to give a campaign credit for a closed opportunity.

As a recovering marketer myself, I know how important it is for the marketing team to identify which campaigns are performing well and leading to closed deals and revenue. The magic is that Account Engagement’s Campaign Influence Models go way beyond just the first touch like the Account Engagement’s campaign source.

3 Models Included in the Account Agagement Customizable Campaign Influence Pack

There are three different models included in the Account Engagement Customizable Campaign Influence pack.

These different models showcase each part of the marketing funnel. The best part is, they are each reflected based on the opportunity. That means they’re great for cross-selling, add-ons, and upgrades!

First-Touch Model

Influence will be attributed to the campaign associated with a contact role whose Campaign Membership Created Date is the earliest of all contact roles associated with an opportunity.

Even Attribution Model

Attribution is divided evenly across all campaigns associated with each contact role on the opportunity. As an example, imagine a scenario where there is a contact associated with four campaigns. Each campaign would receive 25% of the attribution. If they were only on two campaigns it would be 50%.

account engagement b2bma screenshot - graph example influenced by pipeline

Last-Touch Model

Influence will be attributed to the campaign associated with a contact role whose Last Modified date of the campaign member is last for all contact roles associated with the opportunity.

account engagement b2bma screenshot - graph example

There is so much you can do with these models, and it gives you great insight into how assets are performing all across the marketing funnel. For even more information on why campaign influence should be a part of your strategy, check out this blog on Salesforce and Account Engagement Marketing Reporting here.

We at Sercante even have a great starter pack that has the report types built out automatically making the process easy to set up! You can check out the Campaign Influence Starter Pack here.

Step-by-Step Instructions to Build the Custom Recipe in B2BMA Using Campaign Influence Models

Now to the fun part!

Step 1: Selecting the Objects in the recipes

Before we get too far, we want to make sure we select the right objects in Data Manager. Open Analytics Studio from the app launcher. From there, select Data Manager.

Now we are in Data Manager. We want to make sure the Campaign and Campaign influence objects are syncing. Select the Connections tab and review the list of currently syncing objects.

Once you have verified your objects are there and ready to go, we can build out the recipe!

Step 2: Selecting joins

First, select the recipes tab. You can create a brand-new recipe or group it into an already-created recipe.

Then Add in your data. Select Add Input.

* Note: If you are using an existing recipe, you can click on the Add Input button at the top left.

Pardot Screenshot - b2bma add input data build recipe

Select Campaign object.

Pardot Screenshot - add input data campaign

This will be the step where if there are specific campaign fields like budget, leads in campaign, or any additional campaign fields, you will make sure they are selected in the fields’ columns.

Don’t worry, the party isn’t done yet!

To add in Campaign Influence, hit the plus button next to the campaign. Then, select Join.

Then select Campaign Influence: again if you see any Campaign Influence field you want, select it here!

Pardot Screenshot - select data input to join

This next part is KEY to get the whole thing to work. When selecting the join make sure you select an Inner Join. Make sure your Join Keys are IDs.

Final step: do one more join. Select the plus button again, and this time add in Campaign Influence Model.

This is key because it allows us to have the model name versus just the model ID. Jin Keys will be the Campaign Influence Model ID.

Pardot Screenshot - campaign influence model join keys

Step 3: Output and Review

The last step is adding an output! Now from here, if you want to do any data manipulation or transformation, you can simply click the plus button and apply them in the data model. Filtering is great to break down by business units or even specific campaigns or campaign types. If you don’t need anything additional, that is it!

Your recipe should look something like this:

From there, it is always best to check naming conventions and make sure you know where the dataset will be hosted. You can leave it in your private app if you want to do some testing before you move it to the B2B Marketing Analytics app.

After the dataset has been created, you want to begin testing. Take a small set of data (I personally like using a month date filter — makes the data easier to digest!) and see if it matches up to the data you are seeing in Salesforce.

Once you feel good. you are ready to hit the ground running!

Let’s wrap it up so you can start building your custom recipe in B2BMA!

Creating this custom recipe in B2BMA can open up a ton of possibilities, from looping in additional campaign and contact fields to even making a whole dashboard that reflects your ABM Strategy and what campaigns helped influence those results!

Either way, you now have more accessible Campaign and Campaign Influence data with the enhanced features of CRM Analytics. And remember, you can always reach out to team Sercante for help along the way.

Original article: Create a Custom Recipe in B2BMA with Account Engagement Campaign Influence Model

The post Create a Custom Recipe in B2BMA with Account Engagement Campaign Influence Model appeared first on The Spot.

By Cara Clanton-Pope|2023-10-13T18:09:47+00:00October 13th, 2023|Categories: Analytics & Reporting, Pro Tips, revive, Strategy|

A Campaign Member’s First Associated Date records the date a Lead/Contact became a member of a Salesforce Campaign, and it’s a great metric to use in your reporting. First Associated Date can be used to show how many Leads/Contacts a Campaign touched in a given time period, how long the Lead/Contact was in the campaign before they moved to a “Responded” status, or how long the Lead/Contact was in the campaign before an associated Opportunity was opened. However, sometimes the Campaign Member’s first associated date gets skewed.

Common causes of this are:

Lead/Contact should have been added to the campaign on September 15th, but was stuck in the Account Engagement sync queue until October 1st
New Leads from an event we’re not uploaded into Salesforce until a few weeks after the event
Campaign Members were brought over from another Salesforce org during a migration
Sales didn’t enter a new Lead they were working with until after the Opportunity was created

If you are relying on Campaign Member First Associated Date for your reporting, any of the above causes can really throw off your data and make a Campaign, or a time period, look less successful than it actually was. Luckily, you can backdate this field with a few system permissions and the help of Data Loader!

You can insert, but not update!

Before we get into the nitty-gritty of how to do this, it’s important to note that you can’t update the Campaign Member First Associated Date of existing Campaign members. You can only insert new Campaign Members with a backdated first associated date. However, you can use Data Loader to export Campaign Members, their Campaign Status, their dates, etc. from a Campaign, delete the Campaign Members, then re-add them to the Campaign with new dates.

Permissions needed

The first step to updating First Associated Date is enabling “Set Audit Fields Upon Record Creation”.

Navigate to Setup > User Interface

Ensure the “Enable “Set Audit Fields upon Record Creation” and “Update Records with Inactive Owners” User Permissions” option is selected

Select Save

Next, create a Permission Set for “Set Audit Fields Upon Record Creation” and assign this Permission Set to the user(s) who will handle the Data Loader imports.

Navigate to Setup > Permission Sets
Select New
Name your Permission Set “Set Audit Fields Upon Creation”
Select Save
Within your new permission set, type “Set Audit” into the “Find Settings” box
Select Set Audit Fields Upon Creation

Select Edit on the resulting page and select the Set Audit Fields Upon Creation checkbox
Select Save
Select Manage Assignments
Select Add Assignments
Select any users who will be handling the Data Loader imports of Campaign Members, then select Next and Assign

Import your data

Finally, get your Data ready for import! At a minimum, you’ll want to make sure your file includes:

Campaign ID
Lead ID and/or Contact ID
- If you are importing both Leads and Contacts into the Campaign, I recommend splitting the import into 2 files.
Campaign Member Status (if different from the Campaign’s default Status)
Campaign Member first associated date
- Ensure the column is formatted using one of the options below, otherwise you will get an error.
  - MM/DD/YYYY (example: 04/23/2012)
  - DD/MM/YYYY (example: 23/04/2012)
  - YYYY-MM-DD (example: 2012-03-25)

To import the data

Open Data Loader and login
- Note: Updating Campaign Member First Associated Date is not possible with the Data Import Wizard, only Data Loader.
Select Insert
- Note: The ability to map to Campaign Member First Associated Date will not be available if you select Update or Upsert.
Check the Show all Salesforce Objects checkbox and search for CampaignMember

Select your CSV file and click Next
Select Create or Edit a Map and map your fields
- CreatedDate is the field you’ll need to map to the Member First Associated Date column

Select OK > Next > Finish

And Voila, beautiful, accurate Campaign Member data!

Original article: Fix Your Reports! How to Backdate Campaign “Member First Associated Date”

The post Fix Your Reports! How to Backdate Campaign “Member First Associated Date” appeared first on The Spot.

By Erin Duncan|2023-10-12T18:49:12+00:00October 12th, 2023|Categories: Analytics & Reporting, Data Management, Pro Tips, revive|

Marketing Cloud Intelligence (previously known as Datorama) is a tool that offers many potential uses. But with those uses comes the uncertainty that you are using the tool to its maximum potential or even correctly. That’s where a Marketing Cloud Intelligence audit can help.

In this blog post, we’ll cover the reasons you should audit your Marketing Cloud Intelligence instance, the steps to take during your audit, and what you should do with the information you gain.

Why would I need a Marketing Cloud Intelligence audit?

There are several reasons you could need an audit, including but not limited to the following topics.

Reason #1. You want to validate the effectiveness of your work within the platform

Having worked with this tool for years, we have seen it all. An Intelligence audit serves as a second set of eyes to ensure your performance is not being stretched or that you are governing your field usage effectively. It can make a serious difference.

Reason #2. You want to explore if you are missing value adds in the platform

Suppose you are already using Marketing Cloud Intelligence for one set use case and not the full suite of features. In that case, an Intelligence audit will review options based on your needs and ask the right questions to ensure you are maximizing value. As a constantly evolving tool, there is always a new data connector, app, or feature to utilize and build value for your team from a few clicks.

Reason #3. API connectors show inaccurate data in reporting/dashboards

It can be discouraging to set up a data flow into Marketing Cloud Intelligence only to find your output from the platform, whether it be reports or visualizations, look off. An audit can guide you on everything from filtering your data to managing redundancies in setup.

Reason #4. Your Marketing Cloud Intelligence instance has mostly sat idle

You can do so much with Marketing Cloud Intelligence, and even automate processes you may not expect. But that is not of help if the platform is sitting empty or unused. An audit will take what you currently have and guide you toward possible uses you may not have explored.

Reason #5. A key admin has recently left your company or organization

Want to understand what your admin was working on and how data flowed before disaster strikes (or perhaps after)? An audit can help put it into clean process flows and documentation that you may be missing, or even help break down existing documentation into usable guidance.

What does our audit look like in practical steps?

After going through lots of Intelligence audits, we’ve come up with a straightforward process that works in most cases.

Every audit will be a bit different (a series of 3,000+ data streams is more complex than a workspace with five streams). But these are the core processes we review during an Intelligence audit.

Step 1. Having a conversation to discover your goals with marketing analytics

With minimal dialogue, we help clients route to what steps are needed to get the most out of Marketing Cloud Intelligence and their larger tech stack.

Step 2. Combining your priorities and our standard template

We center our solutions around clients’ needs, using our standard process as a springboard to ensure there is always something to explore.

Step 3. We share a detailed breakdown of the usage of platform features

We recommend various features to explore such as Einstein Marketing Insights, Reporting, and Dashboards, and how you can maximize their functionalities for the client’s needs.

Step 4. Reviewing premium features, such as Sandbox and Granular Data Center

When you buy into the more complex and pricier features of Marketing Cloud Intelligence, it may be frustrating to find new learning accompanying these tools. We break it all down so those learnings are succinct and easy to follow.

Step 5. Breaking down the impact and effort of platform features

We showcase what tasks are high impact and low effort (and of course other levels of impact and effort) to make sure you get the most out of the platform in a swiftly actionable manner.

What will a Marketing Cloud Intelligence audit provide?

We know that an audit can unlock a powerful set of tools for you, such as the following.

Recommended platform features to utilize

We tailor our audit to your specific needs and make high-level and in-the-weeds recommendations that are centric to your business needs.

A clearer sense of data challenges to explore and recommended fixes

We showcase any glaring issues for you to skip the puzzle-solving and instead work with our tailored guidance to have a steady QA process.

Reducing redundancies for simpler data flow

We make it easy for clients to organize their data streams and remove reporting duplications so they have a clear roadmap to avoid data duplication and increase ease of navigation.

A path forward for using the platform to its full potential

At the end of our audit, you have a simple must-hit checklist based on your needs and a whole set of status updates on platform features and guidance on how to maximize their use when time allows, making a complex journey into a series of steps to explore.

How can I explore an audit with the Sercante team?

We are here to help. Our team includes Marketing Cloud Intelligence system administrator experts and readiness to explore your data to maximum effect.

You can contact our team to explore what your audit could look like and how we can best work together!

Original article: Why You Should Get a Marketing Cloud Intelligence Audit

The post Why You Should Get a Marketing Cloud Intelligence Audit appeared first on The Spot.

By Aaron Stayman|2023-10-09T14:35:52+00:00October 9th, 2023|Categories: Analytics & Reporting, Data Management, Pro Tips, revive, Strategy|

It’s very common for sales and marketing teams to leverage title-based “personas” to influence their activities. Knowing who you are speaking to can radically alter the message content, type, and frequency needed to progress the buying process. In this post, we’ll address why and how to update marketing persona fields in Salesforce using Flow to assist sales and marketing.

Why Use Flow to Update Marketing Personas?

Let’s start with a very simple question. Why flow? The answer is really based on where your data lives and who needs access to it. I’ve used Engagement Studio in Account Engagement to update persona values in the past, but what happens if the prospect is not in Account Engagement? That’s right — no persona will be updated.

This solution accounts for the fact that all Salesforce data might not be syncing to Account Engagement (or Marketing Cloud Engagement) and that sales still needs persona values.

Step 1 – Understand Your Buyers and Influencers

Before we can classify records, we first need to understand who is buying from us, who is influential in the purchase decision, and who is not (this is just as important). This is best achieved by analyzing data and speaking to your sales team.

Analyze the data

Create reports based on closed won opportunities and look at the contact roles for job titles that stand out. Odds are there will be clear winners – titles that appear with greater frequency. It’s also likely that you’ll see a mix of the people who actually use your product and a level above them (based on the purchasing authority needed to complete the transaction).

Talk to sales

Chat with some of the top sales representatives to find out where they are having success. Are there certain leads that they cherry-pick based on job titles? Are there certain leads that they deprioritize based on the same criteria?

Step 2 – Group your data

Now that we know what titles we should be going after (and those that we should avoid), we need to group them into “Persona” (think of these as containers that hold records with similar/related titles). These are the values that we will be populating from our flow and will be used in future segmentation.

It’s important to create values for those that you want to target and those that you do not. An exclusion persona can be just as valuable as a target persona.

Target Personas

Records that are buying from you or are key influencers in the purchase process.

Exclusion Personas

Records that are in your system that do not buy from you and should not be included in campaigns.

Examples could include: Marketing, Sales, Students, and Human Resources to name a few.

Once you have your target and exclusion persona values defined, create custom “Persona” fields (picklist) on the lead and contact objects. I like using global picklists when creating picklists with the same values between objects. Global picklists speed the setup, are great for ensuring consistency, and make maintenance a breeze (should more values need to be added in the future).

Don’t forget to:

Use the same API name on both objects when creating custom fields (this is critical if you want to map the fields back to Account Engagement).
Map the lead field to the contact field on conversion.

Example: Global Picklist Value Set

Step 3 – Determine Keywords

Now that we know what titles we should be going after (and those that we should avoid), and we’ve defined the groups that we would like to use for categorization, we need to identify keywords that can be used to query the records (actually – we’ll be using them in formulas). It would be great if titles were standardized, but they are not. Based on this, we are going to look for common factors.

Example: Marketing

Here are some common marketing titles. It would be great if “marketing” was included in all of them, but it’s not. Therefore, we’re going to use keywords like: marketing, brand manager, campaign, content, media relations, product research, SEM, and SEO in our formula to make sure that we properly tag our records.

Brand manager
Campaign manager
Channel marketing director
Chief marketing officer
Content marketing manager
Content specialist
Digital marketing manager
Director of email marketing
Internet marketing specialist
Media relations coordinator
Product research analyst
SEM manager
SEO specialist
Web marketing manager

Step 4 – Create the Flow (In Sandbox)

We’re going to use a record-triggered flow to update our persona values. The flow will automatically update the persona value when the title field is updated. Since contacts and leads are distinct objects, a flow will need to be created for each object.

Here’s an example of what a very basic flow would look like. This flow is just updating the value to be Marketing, Human Resources, or Other. A full version of this flow would contain many more paths.

Configure Start

This flow is based on the lead object and is triggered when a record is created or updated. Since we don’t want to trigger the flow whenever a lead is updated, we’re using a formula to set the entry conditions. We want the flow to run only when new leads are created (and the title is not blank) or the title field of existing leads is updated to a non-blank value.

Finally, the flow will be optimized for Fast Field Updates, since we are updating fields on the same object.

Create Persona Formulas

This is probably the hardest part of this process. We are going to need to create formulas for each of our persona groups using the keywords that we’ve already defined. It’s important to note that formulas are case-sensitive by default. This is good in some cases but could cause records to be missed in other situations. Fortunately, we can address this as well.

Sample Formula 1

This formula selects the marketing keywords that we identified, but it’s case-sensitive. It would evaluate “True” for a lead with the title “digital marketing manager”, but would not for the title “Digital Marketing Manager”.

OR(

/* Title contains any of these title strings */

CONTAINS({!$Record.Title}, “marketing”),

CONTAINS({!$Record.Title}, “brand manager”),

CONTAINS({!$Record.Title}, “campaign”),

CONTAINS({!$Record.Title}, “content”),

CONTAINS({!$Record.Title}, “Content marketing manager”),

CONTAINS({!$Record.Title}, “media relations”),

CONTAINS({!$Record.Title}, “product research”),

CONTAINS({!$Record.Title}, “SEM”),

CONTAINS({!$Record.Title}, “SEO”)

)

Sample Formula 2

This updated formula evaluates the same keywords that were identified but addresses the case sensitivity issue. Here, we’ve used a function to convert the titles to lowercase and then compared them to a lowercase value. This formula would evaluate “True” for the titles “digital marketing manager”, “Digital Marketing Manager”, or “DIGITAL MARKETING MANAGER”.

OR(

/* Title contains any of these title strings */

CONTAINS(LOWER({!$Record.Title}), “marketing”),

CONTAINS(LOWER({!$Record.Title}), “brand manager”),

CONTAINS(LOWER({!$Record.Title}), “campaign”),

CONTAINS(LOWER({!$Record.Title}), “content”),

CONTAINS(LOWER({!$Record.Title}), “content marketing manager”),

CONTAINS(LOWER({!$Record.Title}), “media relations”),

CONTAINS(LOWER({!$Record.Title}), “product research”),

CONTAINS(LOWER({!$Record.Title}), “sem”),

CONTAINS(LOWER({!$Record.Title}), “seo”)

)

Sample Formula 3

Sometimes, you are going to need a mix of case sensitivity and case insensitivity. As an example, we would not want to update any job title that contains “hr” to Human Resources. This could lead to a lot of false matches. In this case, only titles that contain “HR” in all capitals will evaluate “True”.

OR(

/* Title contains any of these title strings */

CONTAINS(LOWER({!$Record.Title}), “human resources”),

CONTAINS({!$Record.Title}, “HR”)

)

Sample Formula 4

There are also going to be times when you need to look for a specific value, like CEO, and also look for title strings. We can do that too!

OR(

/* Title is any of these values */

{!$Record.Title} = “CEO”,

/* Title contains any of these title strings */

CONTAINS(LOWER($Record.Title), “chief executive”),

CONTAINS(LOWER($Record.Title), “president”)

)

As you can see, there’s a fair bit of work involved in creating and testing the formulas. That’s why working in a sandbox is critical. If you can get all the formulas to update all the values exactly as you would like on the first try, I encourage you to check out our careers page!

Configure Flow Elements

Each path includes a Decision and an Update Records element (learn more about Flow Elements). We’ll walk through the marketing paths and the same logic can be applied to additional paths. The only difference is that the “No” outcome for the final decision should update the persona value to “Other”. We want to add a value to leads that don’t match any of our formulas for two reasons.

We want to verify that they were processed by the flow.
We want to be able to identify the leads that were not matched by our formulas so we can evaluate and improve. This is VERY important.

Decision Element

The element is pretty straightforward. The “True” outcome looks for leads where the marketing formula evaluates to “True”. Leads that do not evaluate true progress down the “False” outcome and move to the next decision element.

Update Records

Leads that match the “True” outcome conditions then proceed to the Update Records element. This is where the magic happens and the record is updated in Salesforce.

Debug

The final step before activating your flow is to do some debugging. Test by updating the titles of a few leads to make sure that they progress down the correct path, Be sure to vary the case of the titles to make sure that upper, lower, and mixed cases work as expected.

Step 5 – Rinse and Repeat

Once deployed into production, your flow is not going to be perfect. There are going to be some records that are classified as “Other” that should fall into other categories. That’s OK!

The final step is to do regular reviews and updates of the records that have the “Other” persona. It’s possible that we missed a keyword on our first pass or that a new hot title has emerged. I compare this a lot to scores in Account Engagement. You don’t quit once you define your scoring model, you evaluate and refine it. The same process applies here.

Give it a Shot!

We’ve done a lot in a short post. I encourage you to give this a shot in your sandbox. You’ll be surprised by the number of records that you’ll be able to update and the value that it will bring to your sales and marketing teams. If you get stuck, let us know. That’s why we are here!

Shout out to Heather Rinke and Jason Ventura for their collaboration in building this process!

Original article: How to Update Marketing Personas Using Salesforce Flow

The post How to Update Marketing Personas Using Salesforce Flow appeared first on The Spot.

By Mike Morris|2023-10-04T15:25:39+00:00October 4th, 2023|Categories: Analytics & Reporting, Data Management, Marketing Automations, Pardot, Pro Tips, revive|

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