Hi Ashley,
We never got any best practice recommendations from the community. So we did what we could but it still creates problems when people submit multiple forms in a short period of time (e.g. within 5 minutes). The CLR briefcase method (which you might hear about from time to time) does not solve this problem with passing query string information (as it was explained to us by tech support).
Basically, we have query strings we want to capture on a form submit that we want to pass over to SFDC campaign member records so that our sales reps can see the information. So we created Eloqua contact fields for these query strings and use the JS code above to populate these values so that when they sync with SFDC they pass the data.
Problems:
- if SFDC rep creates a new record in SFDC after a sales call and directs prospect to one of our forms, Eloqua has no way of knowing this record exists and creates a new lead in SFDC. Because we don't want this, we have had to put a wait step into the SFDC update programs to account for this (30 minutes wait step in program to account for Auto Syncs that we have running every 30 minutes). You try to solve one problem but you may be creating another
- next problem is if someone submits multiple forms in a short period of time the sync doesn't always capture the information properly (as it relates to these query strings being properly synced with Campaign member information in SFDC) because it is simply overwriting the field values in the same way Campaign ID and Campaign Status work. This has been an equal problem for us before and after we put the 30 minute wait step mentioned above into the SFDC Update Program.
Maybe we are thinking of this completely wrong, but we have not heard any other good suggestions on how to accomplish this. We want to pass all this data over to SFDC via campaign members. We also added a program in Eloqua that deletes the values in these query string fields (via update rules) on the contact record (we can capture up to 4 query string values on a form) so that if our marketing team ever forgets to put in all 4 query strings on a new form (or we start capturing new query string information) we don't accidentally pass over old information into a new campaign member record inside SFDC. The only other way we could think of this working for us with proper form submission data being passed over to SFDC (i.e. including query string data), is to redo all the integration steps in SFDC Update Rule 2.0 and some of the external calls to reference a Custom Data Card instead of the Eloqua Contacts table. With data cards we believe every transaction would be recorded and we could pass it over to SFDC without any concerns. The challenge is it would be a lot of work to redo, and until we get feedback (confirmation) that it would work we have not tackled that project yet.
Hope this helps. If I'm wrong with any of my assumptions above please let me know We are always looking for better ways to do things inside Eloqua.
Cheers,
Cristian