Synchronising tracking data back to Salesforce from Marketing Cloud

Question

The official documentation from Salesforce is to use Salesforce Data Extensions if you want to push tracking information from Marketing Cloud to Salesforce (https://help.salesforce.com/articleView?id=mc_co_salesforce_data_extensions.htm&type=5).

This is what we've done but I've noticed that after creating data extensions in the data extensions folder, emails sent are still being tracked and tracking is still being sent to Salesforce.

My question is can I create data extensions anywhere and tracking will always be sent to sales cloud? what do i need to look out for to insure that tracking is being sent?

Answer 1

This is a bit of a tricky topic and it's not documented as well as it should be.

If you are sending Emails via Journey Builder, then it doesn't matter if your Data Extension is in Salesforce Data Extension folder or in the regular Data Extension folder, as long as you have the Send Tracking To Sale Cloud checked it will work.

If you are sending Emails via regular Send and your target is either Salesforce Campaign or a Salesforce Report, then the tracking will be sent to Sales Cloud, but if you target a regular Data Extension, then Tracking will not be sent to Sales Cloud.

User-Initiated-Send and Salesforce-Send are fortunately working in a clear way, and thus eliminating any doubts when sending emails through Automation Studio. Use Salesforce-Send for Salesforce Data Extensions / Reports / Campaigns to have the tracking sent to Sales Cloud.

Other than that, just make sure you are using either the 18-digit PersonContactID or LeadID as the Subscriber Key and have the Send Tracking to Sales Cloud always marked.