Marketing Cloud Mobile Connect Contacts have ID only - no other data

Question

Hi Marketing Cloud Community

Using Marketing Cloud Connect synchronised Data Extensions with Leads, Contacts, Campaigns, Campaign Members synced and working, I can create Filtered Lists in Mobile Connect based on the Salesforce data.

In this case I can filter to select all Leads and Contacts which have a related Campaign Member record with the specific CampaignID I want. The List populates to include the correct records (as far as I can tell).

However the only information that gets brought in is the record ID - no other info. This is confusing, as the information is obviously available for the filter to work from, but then not available to actually use for the send.

I have seen some articles on stackexchange in the past where the information was brought in from Contact Builder using an Import Activity, but this shouldn't be required anymore if I have understood the functionality of Mobile Connect being able to directly access Date Extensions - can anyone confirm?

Have I missed a step in configuration? Do I need to Link the Data Extensions? Do I need to setup a Data Relationship?

Marketing Cloud Support has suggested importing the contacts with a CSV which seems to rather miss the point.

Kind Regards

Matt

Answer 1

Using Data Extensions as target audiences with MobileConnect isn't as straightforward as it is using them in other Marketing Cloud studios.

You need to have the following defined in the Data Extension:

• Phone type field (just one is allowed)
• Locale type field (just one is allowed)
• Field marked as Subscriber Key
• Data Extension marked as Sendable

In addition, make sure you always choose to Normalize Phone Numbers, documentation specifically requests it to be done even if they were already normalized prior to an import.

Make sure your Locale field has a valid locale.

In addition, note that sending to a Data Extension audience works only with scheduled or automation send method.

What you have provided on your screenshot is from All Contact list, which is not the MobileConnect audience by default. This list contains all possible Contacts on your MC account.

To answer to your questions - no, you do not need to set up Data Relationships or link Data Extensions.

Instead create a new Data Extension with required fields + fields you want from your Salesforce Synchronised Data Extension. Then write an SQL query to populate this Data Extension with values from your SF Synchronised Data Extension.