Marketo/Salesforce Sync - Contact Object Only

[Jaredjo02]

Our Salesforce instance is moving to "Contacts only" - they are removing the Lead Object and everything coming in will be a Contact Record. Are there any implications for the sync going forward?  Thank you

[Balkar_Singh]

Not an expert of Salesforce here, but if Lead object does not exists, that means any information mapped to Lead object to Person Object in Marketo (Marketo fields which map only to Lead object) will not exist. There could be workflows which specify a condition, SFDC Type = Lead/Contact  - those won't really be needed but I have a feeling that this is unnatural. Looking for a better answer.

[SanfordWhiteman]

Do you sync people to SFDC that are initially created on the Marketo side? (i.e. using Sync to SFDC or any of the implicit sync flow steps like Create Task)

[PeeyushSachdeva]

Hi @Jaredjo02,

From a Marketo-SFDC sync perspective, there are a few things to consider when moving to a Contacts-only model (no Leads):

• If the Lead object is removed, all new records will sync directly as Contacts. Make sure your Marketo sync user has the right permissions to create/update Contacts.

• Any Leads currently in Salesforce will need to be converted to Contacts (tied to Accounts). Without this step, you may run into sync errors or broken references from Marketo.

• If your Lead Lifecycle currently lives on the Lead object (New → MQL → SAL → SQL → Converted), you’ll need to rebuild this model on the Contact object.

• Any SFDC reports, assignment rules, or workflows built on Leads will need to be rebuilt for Contacts. Deduplication rules may also need a revisit, since new people will no longer pass through the Lead stage.

• Before go-live, test the end-to-end flow (new record created in Marketo → synced to SFDC as Contact) and review lifecycle alignment with your sales team to avoid gaps

[Devesh]

In Marketo, it doesn’t make a difference if you move to a contact-only approach. If new records are created in Marketo, they will still be pushed to SFDC as Leads. When you mention moving to a contact-only approach in SFDC, it’s important to note that contact-account relationships can be achieved in two ways:

1. Uploading the record directly as a Contact in SFDC, or

2. Creating the record first as a Lead and then converting it—either to a matched account or by creating a new account before conversion.

I’m not sure about the reasoning behind bypassing Leads entirely, as this is generally not considered a best practice. A future-state risk is that it could result in duplicate accounts in SFDC, which would be difficult to clean up.

From a sync perspective, however, this setup should work without major impact.

Also, are you hoping to use native sync functionality or hoping to setup custom sync?