Removing multiple leads from a flow due to 1 lead's email response

[Anonymous]

Hi Marketo Community!

I have a scenario that I would love to get your help on. Here's my proposed Marketo cycle:

1. We create a Marketo Smart Campaign that sends emails to 5 people (all from Company ABC)
   • Flow steps include:
   • Send Email
   • Wait 4 days
   • If no response, send 2nd email
   • wait 4 days
   • If no response, send 3rd email
2. We send the 5 emails to 5 leads from Company ABC
3. 1 one of the leads responds to us.
4. We want to take all 5 of those leads out of the flow because at least 1 employee from company ABC responded.

How would I go about doing this? Our current implementation includes Marketo and Salesforce.

p.s. Here's my current solution that only solves half of it...

1. When lead responds, my company's rep will reply to that email and log the activity using Cirrus Insight in Salesforce.
2. Create a Trigger campaign that says, if lead received "Email X" and "Activity was logged contaings Re:", then remove from flow.

The issue is... that only removes that 1 lead and not the 4 others from the same company.

Really appreciate it!

[Anonymous]

Omg... I'm silly, Disregard that last post Justin!

Haha thanks so much. 

[Anonymous]

Hey Justin,

Thanks for the tips. It's weird though, I tried created a formula field on the Contact record that references the Account fields but can't seem to insert any fields from the Account level. My "Select Field"dropdown only has fields associated to Leads.

If I can get this last part to work i'm sure this entire issue will be resolved haha.  

[Anonymous]

From Marketo's perspective, SFDC account fields are available for use in triggers/filters on each Marketo lead (SFDC Contact) that belongs to that SFDC Account. So simply by having it at the SFDC Account level, it will be visible in Marketo and you can use it. 

If you want it available on the Contact record in Salesforce for some reason, you could create a formula field on the Contact record and reference the Account field in it. 

But just make sure to use the Account version of the field in your Marketo filters...formula fields don't trigger the Marketo/SFDC synch so you may not have current data for the formula field in Marketo. 

[Anonymous]

Hey Justin and Dory,

Thanks again! I love how responsive you guys are and you're truly helping me with this pickle. That sounds like a great idea. I've created the Salesforce boolean checkbox entitled "Marketing Responded'. The only issue i'm coming across now is how to perpetuate that "Marketing Responded" checkbox to all of the contacts associated to the account. 

Is it simply a setting in Salesforce i'm overlooking? Or is there something special I have to set up so checking that box will check the box for ALL contacts in the account?

Many thanks 

[Anonymous]

Hey Dory -- one issue I see here is that Marketo can't write to SFDC Account fields, only Contact fields -- at least, according to Marketo support. I have bumped up against this before and had to find a work-around because of it. 

Correct me if I'm wrong and this can work somehow (it would be awesome if it could!) 

[Dory_Viscoglio · Accepted solution]

Jon-Sun, if you just tweak your step 2 slightly, you should be able to accomplish this without apex, like Justin mentioned:

2. Create a Trigger campaign that says, if lead received "Email X" and "Activity was logged contaings Re:", then remove from flow.

Instead of immediately removing them from the flow, I'd have Marketo check a box that correlates to an account field. Then you can have a separate triggered campaign that says if data value of [account field box] changes, then remove from flow.

This way you don't interrupt/change your sales process (this is critical in many organizations), and still accomplish what you're looking for. 

[Anonymous]

Hey Jon-Sun, if your reps can check a field on the Account record manually (as Dory suggested) then the apex isn't even needed.

However, if there's a concern it may not get done, then automating it based on something you know WILL happen could be useful. 

Apex actually isn't that scary, especailly for small tasks like this. You can find offshore developers that do good work at a price that won't break your budget. 

Email me at justin@clearfit.com and I can give you the details of a fellow we work with, if you want to go that route. 

[Anonymous]

Justin and Dory,

Thanks for your suggestions! Our engineers are not familiar with Apex so I may need to outsource that development... It's definitely not possible without use of Apex?

I'm going to try to find somebody to develop the code and let you guys know if it works in the meantime!

[Dory_Viscoglio]

Haha, no worries.... I've done the same thing many times 🙂

[Anonymous]

LOL Dori, sorry didn't mean to write virtually the same thing as you. Your post wasn't there yet when I responded!

[Anonymous]

For similar situations I've had to do something like this. It's not the prettiest though and involves Apex. Also assuming they are 5 contacts of the same Salesforce account. 

1) Create a boolean (checkbox) field on the Account object in Salesforce called "Marketing Responded" (or something similar). 

2) When activity is logged on one of the leads (contact in SFDC) meeting your criteria (e.g., task subject = xyz), have an Apex trigger that changes the boolean field on the Account to true. 

3) Use this data value as a choice in your subsequent email steps: 

If "Marketing Responded is True then Do Nothing" 

Since the Account value is "shared' by all contacts belonging to that account, it should exclude all 5 contacts from receiving the subsquent emails. 

I'd love to find a more elegant and non-code solution but this should work. 

[Dory_Viscoglio]

Jon-Sun, if you're using SFDC, could you put a field on the account level that is checked when someone from any of the companies responds, and then the checking of that box perpetuates to all of the contacts in that company, which could trigger a removal from the campaign?

[Anonymous]

Ah see that would be great, but my smart campaigns include several dozen to a hundred different leads from various companies and it wouldn't be sustainable to separate them into individualized lists by company.

I'll keep that in mind for smaller batches! Thanks 😃

[Josh_Hill13]

Jon Sun,

Yes, Marketo thinks in terms of leads and it would be hard to trigger like this more than one lead.

BUT

What you can do is if the Activity is loggged, then say

If member of Smart List IN "Group of 5", Remove from Flow