The Most Common Sync Errors and How to Troubleshoot Them / Marketo and SFDC
Integrating your CRM system with a Marketing Automation Platform (MAP) can significantly elevate performance, delivering customer experiences that generate real revenue. Marketo and Salesforce are two popular tools that support campaign execution, lead management, and customer information maintenance. Seamless integration between these platforms is crucial for keeping records up to date. Understanding this automated process thoroughly is essential for its efficient optimization. If your organization struggles with sync delays, outdated, or overwritten data, check out these best practices to enhance your experience. We interviewed an expert in this field about the most common sync errors between Marketo and SFDC and how to troubleshoot them effectively.
How does the Marketo and SFDC sync work?
The sync between Marketo and Salesforce relies on a built-out API integration. This bidirectional communication for leads, contacts, and Salesforce campaigns ensures changes are visible in both systems. However, other syncs, like Accounts, Users (SFDC Lead/Account Owner), Opportunities, Custom Objects, or SFDC Activity (Event or Task), are only pushed from Salesforce to Marketo. New records in Marketo are sent to SFDC only when explicitly requested via Smart Campaigns or Program-Campaign Sync.
Marketo pulls new and updated Salesforce records based on the Last Modified Date Time every 5-7 minutes, syncing approximately 10-20krecords per object per hour. Keep in mind that changes made after a sync starts will wait for the next cycle.
Most of the time, it’s unnoticeable – if the process works correctly. The problem occurs when, for instance, your sales team awaits the hot new leads that you just deployed to your SFDC and the Marketo system still hasn’t received them.
Or when it only got some of them. If that happens, that’s the time to take a closer look at what causes sync errors and how to handle them.
How to identify the reason behind record not being able to sync with SFDC?
The reasons behind it may vary but they are often related to the custom rules setup. But how does one even identify the error type?
Sync errors often stem from custom rules set up on the CRM side. To identify error types:
- Check the Marketo Admin Panel: Start by reviewing all sync errors in the Salesforce area within the Marketo Admin panel. This module groups all sync issues together, making it easier to start troubleshooting and improving integration to prevent future problems.
- Analyze Error Details: The error type information provides a detailed description of the issue, including the date of failure and error type. To identify the source, examine the activity log and check for missing or invalid data from submission forms.
Errors are listed from the current time to five days prior, so regular checks are recommended.
What are the main reasons behind records not syncing correctly to SFDC and how to troubleshoot them?
As I’ve mentioned, in most cases our team dealt with, the sync errors were caused by the Custom Rules set-up on the CRM side which controls the data accuracy. The reason can be simple, for example, if a person is from the US, the state field needs to be properly filled out. If some thing is missing in the submission form or the data is invalid, the sync can’t be processed. That’s why keeping a clean database helps.
Other sync errors can be due to custom logic preventing synchronization. For instance, when a client’s system could not sync Contact Objects to SFDC as the ship-to-address field in Salesforce was empty. Resolving such issues may require updating specific fields in SFDC before Marketo can successfully sync.
The custom logic set-up on CRM is much more complex. Moreover, it has further exceptions making it impossible to cover them all. But these examples show that sometimes less means more – ‘over-engineering’ the process may cause some major synch issues.
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