Improved SFDC Custom Object Integration Trigger, Tokens, Flow choice

[Anonymous]

Marketo needs to improve its current integration with Salesforce Custom Objects. Right now, all you can do is filter with a "Has [CUSTOM OBJECT]" filter, and add some constraints (from Custom Object fields); or trigger off of a basic "Add to [CUSTOM OBJECT" trigger.

However, this is an incomplete and insufficient level of integration for what most marketers need to do with their Custom Objects. The bare minimum of what we should be able to do are:

1. Trigger off of Custom Object field. So if a Custom Object has a Status, you can say when the Status = X or no longer empty, then trigger a series of steps. 

2. Add Custom Object Tokens. We are currently unable to bring in any Custom Object field values into an email or landing page. {CUSTOM OBJECT FIELD}.

3. Add Custom Object Fields to the Flow. Right now, we can't put choices in a Flow that key off Custom Object field values. For example, if a custom object field is a Utility Company, we cannot say, "Send Email A if Utility Company is A; send Email B if Utility Company is B".

4. We should be able to see the 1:1 relationship between a given SFDC Standard Object (e.g. Contact) and Custom Object (and its fields). Right now, with the "Has [Custom Object]" filter, that just looks for a Marketo record (Lead or Contact, etc.) with that [Custom Object], but then all the Custom Object fields are clustered together. However, that's an imperfect filter if the record has TWO or MORE Custom Objects. B/c then it might pull in the wrong Custom Object field. This can perhaps be mollified if we were to correct #1 and #3 above. But in any case, it should more closely mimic the relationship in SFDC - where you can have a Custom Object and its fields grouped together.

In addition to custom object, the Opportunity object integration is very weak. We cannot read and pull in all fields and we should be able to.

This would not be a "nice to have" but critical to have for marketers to run effective campaigns and provide value to their customers.
Thanks!
Nami

[Anonymous]

Some great ideas there Nami.

A quick point on number 1. I believe that you should be to use custom object fields as triggers already. The triggeres will appeard as constraints on the "Added to Custom_object_name" Trigger that you will see in a smart campaign smart list.

To enable custom object fields for the trigger you need to go to
1. Admin -> Salesforce -> Custom object sync
2. Select the already synched custom object from the tree on the right
3. Select Edit Visible fields. If your object is in use this option will be greyed out, you will have to remove any filters referencing the custom object.
4. A pop up will appear like below and you can check any box beside the field name in the trigger column and save.

. 

[Anonymous]

Hi Cathal,

I understand that you can have Custom Object triggers off the fields, but as I said in the last sentence of my first paragraph - it is only with a simple "Added to Custom Object" function. What if the record already existed as a Custom Object and only the value changed?

I've created a pseudo workaround months ago with several of your employees - Damien & Stefan, along with several other employees that involves 3 different smart campaigns - 1) to set a baseline in a smart list - run once before 2nd is started, 2) add any new records that fit the criteria to the smart list - do this every day, 3) have flows that run from those added to that smart list created in #1 and edited in #2.

But this is neither ideal nor practical from a marketer's point of view. Your Marketo employees and I have thought about this for over 6 months now, so I don't think your solution is what we need, as we've already looked into that back in either end of last year or early this year.

If you'd like to discuss this further or see the workaround campaigns I've created, please let me know. You can reach me at nami@sunrunhome.com.

Thanks,
Nami

[Kimberley_Short]

I completely agree with Nami on this.  Custom Objects are pretty common for a lot of organizations.  Not being able to use tokens for cutom object fields is extremely inconvenient and a huge limitataion in my view.  The custom fields do show up under Salesforce - Object Sync - Fields so they're obvious identifiable so why can't we use tokens?  This has just caused me a huge set back on a project I'm working on. 

My organization has multiple instances of Salesforce and right now we're only using Marketo for one of those instances.  In our other SFDC instances, we use MANY custom objects.  Because of the limitations surrounding Custom Objects in Marketo, we could never start using it....it's a shame.

[Anonymous]

Yes! It's crucial to get a better custom object integration!

[Anonymous]

It is indeed extremely disappointing that there is no better solution for this.

[Anonymous]

This is critical.  We have many custom objects... but our most frequently used (for communications) is a set of relationships that connect a contact to an account (Primary Contact, Facilities Lead, Business Manager, Board Member etc).   We need to access this data for smart lists so we communicate with all people who are Primary contacts for example.  

[Anonymous]

I completely agree with your ideas.   We deal quite a bit with organisations with some fairly complex SFDC setups...let me see if I can help with some of your points:

1. Trigger off of Custom Object field. 

Have you thought about doing this in a batch recurring campaign?

Has Object with Filter of field?  Then set it to run based on this criteria every morning?  Ideal?  No..especially if the values might change multiple times in that day.  But maybe in some scenarios this may work for you.

2. Add Custom Object Tokens. 

This one I unfortunately kind of get.  Custom objects with leads/contacts/or person accounts are a 1:Many relationship.  Even if in some cases the contact or lead might only have one object associated to them.  The record still has the capabilitiy to have multiple.  i.e. a Contact can have 1 or 1000 opportuntiies associated, multiple contracts, assets, etc.  So in the case of Tokens, how does the system know which token for which object it should be merging with?  

The best I think they could do eventually is...fire the field based on the Object that triggered the email, but its going to be very hard when it comes to filters.  Running a query like...Show me everyone who has an opp that closed won last year.  Then I'm going to use the {{Opportunity Amount}} field to populate my email.  Someone who has 3 opps associated to them is going to qualify 3 times...How do we work that out?

3. Add Custom Object Fields to the Flow. 

Have you thought about creating smart lists for each of these and triggering the If Step off of their membership?  We do this with a car dealership...Now I can't run an If Step that says show me everyone with Car A where their Lease is set to expire.  But I do have a smart list that has all Car A people with leases set to expire and I can say...If Member of Car A Smart List List => Send Email A; and if Member of Car B Smart List => Send Email B.

Now this might put you in the business of creating a number of Smart Lists...but again maybe it helps out in some scenarios for you.

4. We should be able to see the 1:1 relationship between a given SFDC Standard Object (e.g. Contact) and Custom Object (and its fields).

I'm not quite clear on this one....

What ideally I'd like to see is something similar to the Opportunities Tab, but for all custom objects.  As I mentioned above...I'm not sure its going to be 1:1 in many scenarios, but it would be great to see a list of all of the objects they are associated to.  I think this is very key to better integration down the line as I think the tabs right now are quite cluttered.

5.  Opportunity data:

Now you mentioned that you can't see every field on your opportunity.  Which field can't you see?  Unlike the other custom objects you actually CAN trigger off of this object's updates.  "Opportunity is Updated" ...now that would be great to have for all custom objects.  "Custom Object is Updated" Trigger.  But I feel like you should be able to see every field that the user license has privileges for.  What you can't see, which is what kils me and I have an idea for somewhere on this forum is filtering by PRODUCTS!

Anyways, hope some/any of this helps out with some scenarios that you're looking at.

[Anonymous]

We have a pretty advanced Org structure that contains multiple custom objects for related information that shouldn't be stored on a Lead/Contact object. Unfortunately since we cannot include those fields in an email template I had to create them on the Contact object. The problem is maintaining the data between the custom object and the Contact object has become an admistration nightmare. This is definitely the #1 feature I'm looking for Marketo to develop.

[Anonymous]

Being able to trigger off custom object data value changes would be a huge benefit to our organization.  We use custom objects to provision some of our products, we want to be able to trigger a welcome email immediately when the status changes on the custom object.  Definitely a top feature I'm looking for too.

[Anonymous]

I too am looking to Trigger a Smart Campaign off of a Custom Object Data Value Change.  Also the ability to include a Custom Object Token in an email is highly desired.