Add Yards To Your Drive With Pardot And Salesforce CRM

Golfers are always looking for a way to improve their swing — get more distance, more accuracy, shave just a few strokes off their game. Probably the easiest way to do this is with new clubs. Dad’s crummy old wooden clubs might be a fine conversation starter, a family heirloom of sorts, but they won’t get the job done. While they may not be cheap, new clubs are essentially an investment.

A new set of clubs doesn’t require hours of hard work on the links or a coach. They just work. They do this because they are a finely honed tool that, essentially, does some of the work for you. And while marketing campaigns aren’t as exhausting as 18 holes, there is an equivalent to new clubs. They are called automations. Pardot leverages them to give B2B businesses better insight.

Off the tee

Pardot (currently known as MC Account Engagement) is marketing automation software that makes use of APIs to communicate with outside platforms like Salesforce. With it, marketers can recognize which potential customers are likely to buy their product and determine the most efficient way — and time — to convert them.

By automating several aspects of a B2B company’s operations, Pardot treats each prospect uniquely as they familiarize themselves with the brand. The software leverages customer information and behavior to steep marketers in relevant data that empowers them to support the sales team throughout the sales funnel.    

Because Salesforce CRM is a hub, it hosts the lion’s share of customer activity. An integrated system can usher relevant information over to Salesforce CRM, but this requires an API. An add-on, Pardot acts as a gatekeeper for prospects, letting in ones that are ready for conversion.

Because Salesforce CRM primarily handles things such as lead and opportunity lifecycles, account and contact data and case management support, sales teams are often the primary users. However, Pardot is designed for things such as capturing and scoring, email marketing and potential-customer behavior, making it ideal for marketers.

From the Fairway to the Green

Pardot helps marketers by automating several aspects of marketing. It can add rules and criteria to customer behavior. For instance, if a customer doesn’t click on an email within a week, Pardot can automatically set them up for a drip campaign. Additionally, it has website tracking and allows for more robust email reporting, which gives insight into how email campaigns are performing.

Depending on what a business uses Pardot for, it can greatly expand the options available for marketers and sales teams. Whether it allows for more targeted segmentation, enriching prospect information or honing in on which leads sales teams should nurture based on scoring and grading, Pardot makes marketers and sales team members’ lives easier.  

Further, since everything is now automated, once the attributes are set up, they are continually updating and adjusting in real time. Once a company uses APIs to build something, there is less of a need to send emails based on data and other systems, which minimizes human error.

All this is possible because of the Pardot addon’s bi-directional sync, meaning it communicates with Salesforce and Salesforce CRM communicates with it. Typically, Salesforce CRM keeps Pardot apprised of the ins and outs of the sales journey, allowing marketers a better understanding whether a lead is qualified. Similarly, Pardot feeds Salesforce CRM information on prospects.

This allows marketers to support the sales team up and down the sales funnel, intervening if a lead’s progress stagnates and sending them on a customized journey. Further, marketers can continue to foster engagement with leads that convert to customers by upselling, handling cancellations or even encouraging renewals.

The Scorecard

Knowing what information a business needs to have access to depends on the business’s needs. Maybe it needs an Object API to access various Objects between Salesforce CRM and Pardot. Perhaps an Export API is needed to allow an external system to query off Pardot data, e.g., a regulatory audit that requires a business to retrieve all of its email opt-outs. It all depends.

While using APIs is less costly than building everything from scratch, it can still add up. An experienced partner can assist in giving insight into which APIs are necessary for a business’s needs. So, shave a few strokes off a round with a modern tool. Let Pardot join forces with Salesforce CRM. Your game — i.e., your bottom line — will thank you.