Victor Nazarenko. Solutions Architect

5 Stages of Marketing Cloud Implementation

Refusal, Anger, Anger, Anger, Adoration. But that’s from a consultant emotions’ perspective. 🙂

Marketing Cloud is a very powerful tool, that can cover almost any business requirement on a large scale.

But it takes some effort to get there. Here is the most efficient path so far.

1. Assessment

Analysis of existing systems, identifying those responsible for them, selecting tools for implementation goals. (Pro tip: do not forget to define goals before starting implementation)

2. Initial setup

Setting up Marketing Cloud. Preparing the workspace.

Hooray! The subscription is purchased, and now we can start working with the system.

The actions and their order may vary slightly for different implementations.

  1. After selecting, the first thing to do is to check if everything you chose is included in your subscription. Special attention should be given to the Sender Authentication Package and SSL if you plan to create landing pages.
  2. Architecture Development: The hierarchy of business units and their connection with Sales/Service Cloud and other data sources / data consumers.
  3. Setting up SAP: Configuring the set of email verification and branding tools for landing pages and images (see Sender Authentication Package).
  4. Setting up SSL: Users are intimidated by insecure landing pages. To avoid scaring them, you need to configure SSL.
  5. Naming convention: you will not regret time spent on it!
  6. Setting up mailing addresses: New mail on the configured SAP domain can be set up in a couple of clicks.
  7. Setting up subscription management pages: Profile/Preference Center, Unsubscribe page. Most probably, you have to integrate these with the existing consent management process.
  8. Setting up Mobile Studio for SMS distribution: This will require some correspondence with Salesforce support.
  9. Creating users: Someone has to use all these wonderful features.

And don’t forget to organize content storage in folders following your naming convention in advance. Storing data in the popular format “home computer desktop” will not end well.

3. Setting Up Data Source Integration

Let’s explore integration options.

Option 1: Sales/Service Cloud

Native integration with Sales/Service Cloud.

Allows scheduled and real-time communications (based on the sync schedule and real-time Journey Salesforce Data events)

If master data is stored in Sales/Service Cloud (which is good), then you can set up Marketing Cloud Connect, a native tool for linking the clouds that significantly enhances the capabilities of both.

  • Create integration users in both systems.
  • Integrate according to the instructions in the documentation or on the Trailhead.
  • Configure the volume and frequency of tracking info sync.
  • Specify the objects and their fields (tables and their attributes in Salesforce terminology) for loading into MC, and the update frequency.

Option 2: FTP

Data transfer via the built-in SFTP server of Marketing Cloud or a third-party server

  • Enable SafeHouse (the marketing name for the built-in SFTP) through via a support case.
  • Set up the FTP user.
  • Create Data Extensions (tables) to receive data.
  • Export data from the external system to SafeHouse in the required format.
  • Trigger the processing of this data via File Drop in Automation.

Option 3: API – Data Extensions

Data transfer via API for storage and processing on the Marketing Cloud side

  • Create a new Package in Installed Packages and configure permissions for API access.
  • Create Data Extensions manually or via API.
  • Load data via API into the created Data Extensions.

Option 4: API – Journey

Data transfer via API directly into the campaign activity chain (Journey)

Allows scheduled (based on Journey behaviour) and real-time communications

  • Create a new Package in Installed Packages and configure permissions for API access.
  • Create Data Extensions manually or via API.
  • Create an Entry Source API Event in Journey Builder.
  • Configure the campaign chain.
  • Send records via API into the campaign chain.

4. Campaigns’ Setup

The reason we set up everything above.

I’ll briefly outline only the most common options and the tools for setting them up.

One-off Email Message: Data Extension + Email Template + Single-Send Journey

Trigger on record creation/modification in Sales/Service: Salesforce Data Entry Event + Email/SMS Templates + Multi-Step Journey

Daily (or hourly) segment selection and message sending to the segment: Scheduled Automation + SQL Activity + Email/SMS Templates + Multi-Step Journey

External system adds a client to the campaign chain: New Installed Package + Entry Source API Event + Email/SMS Templates + Multi-Step Journey

5. Setting Up Additional Tools

The upper levels of the hierarchy of needs

After setting up the main tools, you can work on the additional ones, of which there are plenty in Marketing Cloud:

  • Cloud Pages: Landing pages for our campaigns.
  • Advertising Studio: Automatically send audience segments to advertising services.
  • Interaction Studio: Analyze user behavior on the site, nurture leads, and tailor content to user interests.
  • Machine Learning Analytics with Einstein: Make email drafts based on key messages, analyze audience engagement, select the best time to send, and automatically tag content.
  • Data Cloud: Bring your data from multiple sources to create more meaningful customer segments.

Conclusion

People Work with other People

As with almost any project, the most challenging and interesting part of implementing Marketing Cloud is establishing effective collaboration among people. Marketing automation projects often involve a high concentration of different systems and teams in one place, resulting in the clash of various approaches and levels of technical or project expertise among participants. However, these challenges are worth it when all the data gathered in Marketing Cloud start working, achieving the coveted 360-degree customer view.