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Are Custom Objects the best way to handle custom fields that can have multiple selections? (e.g. Person lives in multiple states)

Question asked by John Truong on Feb 20, 2019
Latest reply on Feb 20, 2019 by Jay Jiang

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Hello all,

We are new to Marketo and noticed that you the default fields do not give the option of creating 1:M relationships. It is a 1:1 mapping as far as I can tell?

We would like to store a contacts geographical foot print. For example, we would have the US Federal Government as a contact person but that person is responsible for multiple states.

The end purpose is to have that person be sent specific state blogs contents based upon the states he could belong to. e.g. Email john.doe@company.com can have California, New York and Utah.

Is the best way to do this is create a custom object with the State a column name and then the link back to that person's email in the Custom Object?

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Sanford Whiteman Feb 20, 2019 8:59 AM
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COs are overkill for this purpose. Use a semicolon-delimited String for this field.
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- John Truong @ Sanford Whiteman on Feb 20, 2019 9:16 AM
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  Thank for the quick response sir!
  
  One other thing, we want to sync this with our Custom CRM app. For example, we also have other valuelists that are not standardized but want to put in Marketo for example, a list of business lines we specifically serve. We use lists like these in our custom CRM. The idea is that contacts between both tools share the same valuelist. E.g.if someone were to add an additional value (e.g. like the one above, another state to an email contact in our custom CRM, we could then do an API (possible?) to sync that to the Marketo or vice versa. The reason I liked the CO was that we can store additional data like unique ID's for that valuelist and not just free form text.
  
  However, can we do this syncing with a semicolon-delimited string value too and again am I doing overkill to use COs ?
  
  Thank you,
  John
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  - Sanford Whiteman @ John Truong on Feb 20, 2019 9:23 AM
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    If you're trying to share a picklist of possible values that's outside the realm of COs in any case.
    
    That list could be synced to a {{my.token}} which could in turn be used on Marketo forms. However, it wouldn't automatically "prime" any selects within the Marketo UI.
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    - John Truong @ Sanford Whiteman on Feb 20, 2019 10:08 AM
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      Okay, why do you say sharing a CO is outside the realm? In my limited knowledge, it looks like a custom object is essentially a table with a primary key (linkedID) back to the base Marketo tables?
      
      When you say Prime, you are essentially saying you can't load a "picklist" for a field option?
      
      Another question then, is it possible to have a custom object as a field in a subscriber form?
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      - Sanford Whiteman @ John Truong on Feb 20, 2019 11:31 AM
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        The records in a custom object do not function in any way like a picklist when adding additional records.
        
        When you say Prime, you are essentially saying you can't load a "picklist" for a field option?
        Correct.
        
        Another question then, is it possible to have a custom object as a field in a subscriber form?
        Nope. This is one of the reasons to steer clear of COs unless you're absolutely sure, via technical due diligence, that they're the right fit. They're extremely powerful when called for... but otherwise put you at a number of disadvantages.
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        John Truong @ Sanford Whiteman on Feb 20, 2019 1:13 PM
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        yes, I am understanding the pitfalls right now. I also noticed that I couldn't update or delete values in the custom object without going through the API.
        
        So in this scenario.where the requirements are:
        1. Need to create a custom field that can track 1:M values (e.g. multiple states, lines of business, sectors etc) to a contact or a company
        2. Build smart lists that can filter for this custom field. (e.g. build a list of contacts / companies that belong to healthcare sector)
        3. Have the custom field on a subscriber form where users will pick multiple values from the "picklist'.
        4. Possible syncing back and forth between a custom CRM and Marketo.
        
        What would you recommend on how to achieve this based upon the above requirements?
        Continue with that path of the semicolon delimited String?
        
        Thank you again for all your help, very much appreciated.
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  - Jay Jiang @ John Truong on Feb 20, 2019 2:09 PM
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    The reason I liked the CO was that we can store additional data like unique ID's for that valuelist and not just free form text
    In picklists you can have label values and stored values. What you would save to the marketo database upon submission is the stored value (unique IDs), but you can change the labels (free form text) to what ever you want in you mutlipicklist
    
    Anyway, if you have a custom CRM you need to connect to Marketo, you'll most likely have to use use string fields for mapping to a middleware platform - unless you have the resources to build your own bespoke solution. Depending on the features available, you'd most likely do the translation in the middleware after it collects data from both systems and before it pushes data to the other system.
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Are Custom Objects the best way to handle custom fields that can have multiple selections? (e.g. Person lives in multiple states)

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