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A
Anonymous
November 13, 2015
Question

How to set up Lead Partitions

  • November 13, 2015
  • 3 replies
  • 10191 views

We have several Lead Partitions and each Lead Partition has only one Workspace.

We have an assignment rule in the Default Lead Partition to push the Leads to the correct partition based on a field we called "Workspace Name".

Issue1

When we try to import a Lead to PartitionA but it already exists in PartitionB we get an error message:

"Lead exists in another lead partition in your Marketo account - contact your Marketo admin."

This is somewhat acceptable as there is no assignment rule on PartitionA but would expect the system to automatically create new Leads in the desired partition.

Issue2

When we import a Lead to the Default partition and the Lead already exists in PartitionB the Lead in PartitionB gets updated (with the incorrect values) instead of creating a new Lead in PartitionA based on the assignment rules. This is obviously a serious problem.

Workaround

Load the Leads into the desired partition by sending the email addresses to a Temp field than do a data value change to update the email addresses.

Any suggestion how to fix the issue?

Do assignment do not work for manual imports?

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    3 replies

    Josh_Hill13
    Josh_Hill13
    New Participant
    June 15, 2019

    so one of the secrets of this situation is you can ask Marketo Support to TURN OFF deduping by email address for Partitions. Once the setting is changed, Marketo will allow duplicates within single Partitions and not update a matching email address's record in another Partition. In other words, it won't throw this error.

    Of course, if you upload data to a Workspace which can see more than one Partition, you will still encounter this issue.

    You can also point your API connector to a specific Partition (by number) to create the same effect. I believe the Partition numbers start at 0 for Default (or 1?). Kinda forgot what Support said. They can find out for you.

      A
      Anonymous
      November 19, 2015

      Thanks guys for your prompt response!

      Dan, you were saying that a "lead cannot exist in more than one partition".

      It seems like this is where we are having challenges. Our Client has many business units and they want to keep everything separate. The same individual can become a member of any of the business units using the same email address.

      If they unsubscribe in Marketo through PartitionA the Lead should not be unsubscribed in any of the other partitions.

      Essentially, each bizUnit is like a completely independent organization. Marketo support recommended to use Lead Partitions but it seems like that may not be the correct solution.

      Any thoughts?

      Dan_Stevens_
      Dan_Stevens_
      New Participant
      November 19, 2015

      Hi Peter - while leads cannot exist is more than one partition (in addition to the default partition), they can be shared across more than one workspace.  For example, our lead partitions are country-based.  But in some regions - like the Nordic region - all four countries (Sweden, Denmark, Norway and Finland) have access to each others lead partition since they often go to market as a single region as opposed to single countries.  With regards to the potential unsubscribe issues, you're better off creating a subscription center, rather than leverage lead partitions for this functionality.  There's no way around it when using a single instance of Marketo to represent multiple entities of a business.  When a lead unsubscribes, it will be unsubscribed across the entire instance (if using a single unsubscribe approach).

      A
      Anonymous
      November 19, 2015

      Thanks Dan! I am getting closer to get a good understanding of how this works.

      It sounds like we have to do the following:

      1. work out how to create "duplicates" at the email level through API so that the same email address will have multiple LeadIDs.

      2. Create a Subscription Centre for each workspace by creating a set of Subscription related fields with Workspace Name prefixes.

      3. Make sure Marketo ignores the default 'Unsubscribe' field and uses the fields from point 2.

      4. Make sure the Forms also collect and update information specific to each Workspace.

      Dan_Stevens_
      Dan_Stevens_
      New Participant
      November 13, 2015

      First of all, it's a best practice to do all of your lead partition assignments/routing using custom smart campaigns (within a central program in the default workspace) - and forgo the "assignment rules".  This allows you to define additional logic that may be necessary for your instance.

      Issue1: This is expected behavior.  A lead cannot exist in more than one partition (in addition to the default lead partition - where all leads are stored).  If you need workspace A and workspace B to share leads across their workspaces then allow both workspaces access to both lead partitions.  And yes, Marketo will create the lead within the partition that the lead first entered - as long as the lead doesn't already exist in another partition.

      Issue2: The lead in the default partition is the same lead that exists in Partition B.  The lead in PB is just a reference to the master lead in the default partition.

      Take a look at the presentation I (and @Ashleigh Davis​) gave at Summit last year:

      Best Practices for Operating Your Marketo Environment Across Multiple Workspaces and Lead Partitions

      Sessions – The Marketing Nation Summit, April 13-15, 2015 – Marketo

      Josh_Hill13
      Josh_Hill13
      New Participant
      November 16, 2015

      The lead routing should be a central program inside the Default WS with access to ALL partitions.

      Your Assignment Rules in Admin should mirror this system or just route to Default.

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