New Data Retention Policy - yet another way for Marketo to extract more dollars from their customers?

[Tim_Madel1]

I can't believe there is not more of an uproar about the data retention policy to go into effect August 15.  In my mind, this is crippling Marketo as an effective Marketing automation tool.  First they took away anonymous activity - now this.  Honestly I am not sure of how the competitor's data retention policy compares but this is definitiely prompting me to look at them as serious alternatives.

Sorely disappointed in Marketo......

[Mike_Reynolds2]

Hi Tim Madel,​

I can understand the frustration at having changes made. This change is being made to help improve performance for all Marketo users by standardizing the volume of data that is retained. With unlimited storage of data, you end up with longer and longer search times for anything trying to parse that much data.

According to Forbes, "there are 2.5 quintillion bytes of data created each day" and it is only going to grow as we move into the Internet of Things. 90% of the data in the world was created in just the last two years. With that type of volume, everyone needs to adapt to the changing online landscape.

Marketo is not the only platform making this change, and we're not even the first to implement it. You mentioned checking out some competitors to compare. Eloqua implemented this same 25 month retention policy two years ago but doesn't even offer the extended 37 month option that we do.

There are many options for adapting to this changing landscape in the online industry. We've created a doc that shows you methods of Storing Activity Data Beyond Retention Policy. And have also hosted a Video Link : 2314 that goes through all of the changes in detail and offers work-arounds that many marketers have found helpful.

I hope this helps. Let me know if there's anything else I can help with.

Thanks,

Mike

[Josh_Hill13]

Thanks Mike.

Many firms are adding Marketing Data Warehouses (MDWs) using Hadoop or other big data tools to pull together disparate data from ALL marketing systems. It's generally cheaper to do this than rely on Marketo.

You also have to consider "Will I really use this data?" If you want someone who filled out a form more than 2 years ago, Why? Is that click or form relevant TODAY? Most leads who haven't interacted in the past 90 or 180 days aren't coming back anyway. I wouldn't consider a smart list with

Clicked Link is ANY In Past Before 25 months

useful information to say that group is "Engaged".

Now, if you are concerned with data retention policies from CASL, EU, etc...then it's best to look at what you really need to comply with internal policies and Regulations, and if it's best to export to a cheaper MDW.

[Tim_Madel1]

Thank you for the response Mike. I am not so much worried about the 25 month time frame. It is the 90 day limit for things like web visits and click on links. Based upon our customer’s buying cycle, this makes Marketo useless to us.

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Tim Madel | Global Director, Digital Marketing

Videojet Technologies Inc. | www.videojet.com<http://www.videojet.com/>

Ph: +1-630-694-2537 | Mobile: +1-724-804-8075 | tim.madel@videojet.com<mailto:tim.madel@videojet.com> | Yahoo! IM: tmadel

1500 N Mittel Blvd, Wood Dale, IL, 60191, USA

[Josh_Hill13]

In the past you could ask to opt out of that 90 day limit. So they are charging for that limit to be removed?

[Mike_Reynolds2]

Tim Madel​

That 90 day limit for the high volume activities has always been in place. That part is actually not changing at all.

As Josh Hill​ mentioned, in the past there were some variations that some customers had put in place. However, those customizations are all being replaced by the one standardized policy. The details of that are included in our documentation Marketo Activities Data Retention Policy - Under the Hood and the section that specifically relates to this is Variations of Current Policy​.

As I mentioned, the 90 day limit on high volume activities is actually staying the same as it has been. The one exception would be if you had requested a customized retention policy. Maintaining those customizations isn't scalable and are prone to problems as new features and patches are released. Standardizing the policy across all Marketo instances helps to prevent bugs.

[Steven_Vanderb3]

You could use Interesting Moments to record visits to high value web pages; those will remain on the lead record for at least 25 months.  A good lead score model would also help in tracking the value of a lead after it's web activity has been pruned.