Is there a way to setup a default value for a custom field?

[Anonymous]

Hi All,

We are trying to track changes for lead object ..

We created a custom field (DateTime).. We were hoping this field can be popluated when a lead record changes or a new lead is created.. Is that possible? We were hoping that we can supply a default value (e.g. sysdate). So any time a lead is changed or created, this custom field will be updated with a system date-time stamp.

Has anyone done this before? Is this possible?

Atul

[Jep_Castelein2]

You could use the standard field "Updated At". This field behaves exactly as you describe. 

However, if you want to populate your custom field, use a Change Data Value with the token {{system.datetime}}

[Anonymous]

Hi Jep,

Thanks a million for your quick response.. Here are a couple of things:

1. We need to use a field that can be exposed via SOAP API.. We don't see that Updated or Updated AT being exposed in API.. To be honest, if updated field was exposed via API, we would not need what we are tring to do.. Do we have it right?

2. As a result of API limitation, we were trying to use the custom field.. Given our purpose, I'm not sure (as I'm new to Marketo) how to implement what you have recommended for custom field.. Where do we set this up?

Many thanks in advance.

Atul

[Anonymous]

Hi Jepp,

We figured out how we can manually update the custom field manually by using Change Data Value flow as suggested by you.. Is that you were suggesting for custom field above? If yes, that does really work for our case as we are tring Marketo to automatically update a date/time field when a lead is created or updated or both..Again the reason for us do attempt this is really lack of visibilty of UPDATED field via SOAP API..

I would appreciate any thought or pointer to solve this problem quickly.. We are in the middle of our core development project...

Thanks again..

Atul

[Jep_Castelein2]

Yes
Smart List: Lead is Created AND Data Value Changes, Attribute is "Updated At"
Flow: Change Data Value, Attribute "Your Custom Field", new value {{system.timedate}}
Schedule: run every time

I don't know the API well enough to know whether there is a way to access "Updated At" (I do know that most system fields are not available in the API)

[Anonymous]

Hi Jep,

We did as you suggested. Just to detail this:

1. Created a smart campaign
2. Created smart list, flow
3. Under schdule, I selected Qualification Rule as "Each lead can run through the flow every time"

Then I tried to update a lead and created a lead, our custom field did not get updated which was our goal.

So the question is the campaign really need to be schdule to run at certain frequency. Is that correct? If thats the case, all we can do is update our custom field once a day..

I'm sure I'm missing something here.. Any suggestions?

Atul

[Jep_Castelein2]

Please contact support for further assistance. They can look at your actual campaign and find out why it doesn't work. 

Jep