Marketo API Syc Lead Scenario

[Anonymous]

Hello all
We are trying to sycn and get lead between Marketo and our SQL server.
Here is a problem that I have no clue with.
If a client, John Smith, is already in our SQL server, but he is a very old lead, say last updated in 2000. So we dont sync him to Marketo intially.
However, one day, he filled in a form and he's back to Marketo, but he didnt fill in his phone number. But I have his phone number in my SQL server. If I want to sync him now, using syncLead API ( I am using Java), I can get his phone number updated, but then it will refresh and overwrite everything else he provided just now in the form by the data in the SQL server, which was over 10 years old.
So my question is, is there any way to only sync the values that's not in Marketo and dess not update the rest of the values that's already there.

[Anonymous · Accepted solution]

That must be done programmatically. 

By default syncLead will update all fields it is sending.

Selecting what you are going to update requires three steps:
- retrieve the existing data through getLead
- read the lead attributes to compare against the data to be submitted and decide what data syncLead is going to update
- send the selected attributes via synclead

That process can be applied to any API, not just Marketo SOAP API.

[Anonymous]

Note that you can always specify "Block Field Updates" via Web Service for your fields you don't want to be updated via the API.  Do this via Admin->Field Management, Specify the field and select the Block Field Updates Option.