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Configure the Marketing Cloud Connection

Learning Objectives

After completing this unit, you’ll be able to:

  • Create a Marketing Cloud Connect API user.
  • Complete the connection between Marketing Cloud Engagement and a Salesforce CRM org.
  • Integrate users with Salesforce CRM.

Follow Along with Trail Together

Learn more about the following steps and processes with Trailhead Academy instructor, Brian Richardson. 

4: Configure Marketing Cloud Engagement

Progress chart with Step 4: Configure Marketing Cloud Engagement highlighted.

Halfway there. It’s time to go through some additional configuration steps in both environments to complete the setup. Let’s start in Marketing Cloud Engagement.

Marketing Cloud Connect API User

Just like in Salesforce CRM, Marketing Cloud Engagement requires a user account for its connection to the CRM environment. It’s a best practice to dedicate a user license solely for this purpose. Here’s how to set up your Marketing Cloud Connect API user.

  1. In Marketing Cloud Engagement, hover over your username and select Setup.
  2. From the Setup screen, type Users into the Quick find box and click Users.
  3. Click Create.
  4. Enter your email address for the Reply Email and Notification Email Address.
  5. Enter a unique username, for example MC-API-User.
  6. Leave the External Key field blank, unless your organization requires it.
  7. Select a Time Zone and a Culture Code.
  8. Select API User.
  9. Create a temporary password.
  10. Click Save.

Then finalize user setup by assigning roles to this new user.

  1. From the Users screen, select the checkbox next to the user you just created.
  2. Click Manage Roles.
  3. Click Edit Roles.
  4. Assign the following roles:
    • Administrator
    • Marketing Cloud Engagement Administrator
  5. Click Save.
  6. Log out of Marketing Cloud Engagement and immediately log back in with the Marketing Cloud Connect API User credentials you just created.

Configure the Marketing Cloud Connection

Once logged back into Marketing Cloud Engagement, navigate back to Setup. It’s time to connect your Marketing Cloud Engagement account to the corresponding Sales Cloud or Service Cloud org. Before you begin this process, be sure to log out of your Salesforce CRM account. (Closing the tab doesn’t log you out.) This prevents an incorrect connection, since the system automatically connects to any active Salesforce session.

  1. In Setup’s Quick find field, type Salesforce Integration.
  2. Once found, select Salesforce Integration.
  3. Click Edit.
  4. Make sure Scope by User is deselected.
  5. Click Connect AccountSalesforce Integration Setup screen in Marketing Cloud Engagement with Scope by User and Connect Account circled.
  6. Click OK to acknowledge the popup window.
  7. A login page displays in a new window. If you log in to Salesforce through a company-specific login page, select Use Custom Domain and enter the domain address before entering your user credentials. For example, if your org's login URL is https://example.my.salesforce.com, enter example.
  8. Enter the username and password for the CRM API user that you created in the last unit.
  9. Click Allow to grant access for the Marketing Cloud Engagement API User to access the CRM org.

You just created the handshake between Marketing Cloud Engagement and your CRM org. That established a connected app relationship inside Salesforce CRM. Nice work!

5: Finalize Configuration

Progress chart with Step 5: Finalize configuration highlighted.Now on to the home stretch! It’s time to finalize the configuration of the connected app settings in Salesforce CRM. Log out of Marketing Cloud Engagement and log back in to your CRM account with your personal admin credentials to make these next updates.

Note

Remember to switch to Salesforce Classic before you follow these steps.

  1. In Setup, type Connected Apps in the Quick Find box and click Connected Apps.
  2. Click Salesforce Marketing Cloud EngagementConnected Apps screen with Salesforce Marketing Cloud Engagement selected.
  3. Click Edit Policies.
  4. Under Permitted Users, select Admin approved users are pre-authorized.
  5. If a warning message appears, click OK.
  6. Under IP Relaxation, select Relax IP restrictions.
  7. Under Refresh Token Policy, select Immediately expire refresh token. Pause for effect. What did those steps do? These two steps are needed for ease of use and authentication within connected applications. Want to learn more? Check out Connected App IP Relaxation and OAuth 2.0 Asset help pages for detailed information about these steps.
  8. Click Save.
  9. Scroll down the page and click Manage Permission Sets.
  10. Select the Marketing Cloud Connected App permission set that you created in the previous unit.
  11. Click Save.

Complete the Managed Package Configuration

Next, stay in the Setup screen to finish the Managed Package configuration.

  1. Type Process Automation in the Quick Find box and select Process Automation Settings.
  2. If the Default Workflow User is empty, click the lookup icon and specify a user with System Administrator permissions to be the default workflow user. (We suggest using the newly created CRM API user account.) Process Automation Settings with lookup magnifying glass selected.
  3. Click Save.

This is an important step—skipping it prevents the managed package wizard from properly configuring workflow rules.

Session Settings

  1. Next type Session Settings in the Quick Find box and click Session Settings.
  2. Scroll to the bottom of the page and click Save.

Yes, that’s right: You don’t actually change any settings, but this is a necessary step for the configuration. If this step is not performed, the managed package wizard is not able to add IP allowlisting. Approximately 20+ IP ranges would have to be added manually. No one has time for that!

Marketing Cloud Connector Setup Wizard

Now it’s time to connect your accounts using the setup wizard.

  1. From the top navigation, click the plus icon to navigate to the All Tabs screen.
  2. Click Marketing Cloud Engagement.
  3. Click Verify Remote Site from the popup screen.
  4. Click Okay on the next popup about the MetadataAPI.
  5. Click Start Wizard to begin the setup wizard. (Manual setup requires a great deal of work. But, if you’re interested, you can check out the help documentation.) Marketing Cloud Connect Setup with Start Wizard button highlighted.
  6. The next screen is a prompt for the Default Workflow User you created. Click Next.
  7. Click Next to move forward and acknowledge you’ve saved the Session Security Settings.
  8. Click Next to acknowledge Field-Level Security information.
  9. Click Done to acknowledge the page layout update information.
  10. At the main Marketing Cloud Connector Setup screen, select I agree to acknowledge the automated changes and then click Configure Marketing Cloud Connector.
  11. If all goes well, you are rewarded with a configuration summary. Marketing Cloud Connect Configuration Summary, announcing that the configuration was successful.
  12. Click Okay! to finish the setup wizard.

Once done with the wizard, you have some configuration settings to update. Learn more about these settings in this video clip.

Connect to Marketing Cloud Engagement Within Salesforce CRM

Next it’s time to configure settings for the integration and make the connection in your Salesforce CRM account.  

  1. Click the plus icon to navigate to the All Tabs screen.
  2. Click Marketing Cloud Engagement.
  3. Click Connect to Marketing Cloud Engagement.
  4. Enter the username and password for the Marketing Cloud Engagement API User.
  5. Click Login.
  6. If successful, you see a screen to configure Marketing Cloud Connect settings. Under the Account section on the page, select Email.
  7. In the Sends section, select all options.
  8. In the Notifications section, enter the appropriate email address to receive any error messages from Marketing Cloud Connect.
  9. In the Tracking section, select appropriate options for your organization about the specific email tracking data that Marketing Cloud Engagement sends to the CRM system. Keep in mind that the choices you make for these can affect the overall storage of your CRM org.
  10. Leave the defaults for the rest of the settings and finish by clicking Save Settings.
  11. Select at least one business unit from the Business Unit Management screen and click Save.
Note

Review Marketing Cloud Connect Settings as well as Tracking and Analytics to learn more about settings and their potential impact on your implementation. After configuration, these settings can be adjusted to fit your organization’s needs.

Note

If this user is not verified in the User section of Setup in Marketing Cloud Engagement, be sure to assign a Send Classification of Default Commercial when sending from Sales Cloud.

Marketing Cloud Engagement User Integration

With the connection established in the CRM System, we can now finish the Marketing Cloud Engagement user integration. Log out of CRM and back into Marketing Cloud Engagement using your personal admin account.

  1. In Marketing Cloud Engagement, hover over your name and select Setup.
  2. Next select Users under Administration.
  3. Click the name of the Marketing Cloud Engagement Account API user.
  4. Click Integrate in the Salesforce.com Status field on the user general settings screen. User General Settings screen with Integrate link highlighted.
  5. Enter the username for the CRM API user and click Save Settings.

If successful, the Salesforce.com Status updates to Integrated.

Marketing Cloud Engagement user detail screen with Salesforce.com Status field showing as Integrated.

Note

Remember that these steps need to be done for every Marketing Cloud Engagement Integrated user (those who want to send using Marketing Cloud Connect).

Almost there! In the next unit we run through a scenario to test the connection and make sure everything is working properly.

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