Hard Bounce Smart List - What filter will get me the most accurate data?

Anonymous
Not applicable

Hard Bounce Smart List - What filter will get me the most accurate data?

I am creating a smart list of Hard Bounces and wanted to get a few opinions on the best filter to use. I am running through two options currently, however, I am open to other solutions. My first options is to use the "Email Invalid=true" filter and my second options is to use the "Email Bounced" filter. Which filter would get me the most accurate list of all Hard Bounces? Is there another filter I should use. Thanks in advance for your input!

9 REPLIES 9
Loren_Posendek
Level 4 - Champion Alumni

Re: Hard Bounce Smart List - What filter will get me the most accurate data?

Hey Justin, I'd use your existing filters along with the "Email Suspended = True" filter for hard bounces. This Marketo Product Docs article explains a little more about the Email Suspended filter: Hard and Soft Bounces in Email - Marketo Docs - Product Documentation.

Anonymous
Not applicable

Re: Hard Bounce Smart List - What filter will get me the most accurate data?

Ok great. Thanks Loren! Appreciate the speedy response 🙂

JD_Nelson
Level 10 - Community Advisor

Re: Hard Bounce Smart List - What filter will get me the most accurate data?

Same response as what I wrote, below, is that the overarching question of 'how are you managing your marketing suspended flag?' still applies. This is generally only flagged by an outside batch/trigger that you setup as step 1 or 2 of your new instance.

JD_Nelson
Level 10 - Community Advisor

Re: Hard Bounce Smart List - What filter will get me the most accurate data?

I would answer your question, with a question: Do you track your bounces and update the 'email invalid' flag? Marketo's out of the box 'bounce list' in your Lead Database will define bounces as 'email invalid = true' -- but you can manage your bounces outside of that as well. For instance, a trigger that fires on "email bounces" and preferrably a 'min number of times' constraint as well (I flag after 2 bounces) then the flow marks the email as invalid.

There's also a trigger for 'email bounces soft' which you can setup to monitor over a period of time. I use 6 times in the last 90 days as a default.

Overall, if you're managing your 'email invalid' field with bounce data, as described or some other version, then 'email invalid' would be a good enough way to track what you're doing.

Anonymous
Not applicable

Re: Hard Bounce Smart List - What filter will get me the most accurate data?

Thank for the input JD!

Grégoire_Miche2
Level 10

Re: Hard Bounce Smart List - What filter will get me the most accurate data?

Hi Justin,

Normally, "email bounced" should also show in the "email invalid", but the opposite is not true as "email invalid" also include ill-formed email addresses or can also be set manually or through a smart campaign flow step.

Furthermore, some hard bounced might not show in the email invalid or email bounced smart lists. Some error codes might be wrongly interpreted by Marketo as soft bounces, in which case some hard bounces will actually show in the "email soft bounced" filter.

Te following table, borrowed from Josh Hill​'s Marketo Rockstar Guide, may help you:

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It might be worth setting up a smart campaign that flags as invalid some of these 5xx codes that are treated as soft by Marketo and should be classified as hard.

-Greg

Anonymous
Not applicable

Re: Hard Bounce Smart List - What filter will get me the most accurate data?

Very much appreciated Greg!

Josh_Hill13
Level 10 - Champion Alumni

Re: Hard Bounce Smart List - What filter will get me the most accurate data?

There are some other tips in the Guide and on my site related to this topic.

Some people have also posted docs detailing some of the codes elsewhere.

Josh_Hill13
Level 10 - Champion Alumni

Re: Hard Bounce Smart List - What filter will get me the most accurate data?

And by that you can do a search for Bounced codes or SMTP Codes.

There is also a doc somewhere on the forum with Marketo's Category Bounce Codes that you can access via the Bounced Email filter constraints. I'll try to post my giant list sometime.