Overview
Integrating Salesforce with Apollo enables you to access and keep your data synchronized within both platforms.
Before you integrate Salesforce with Apollo though, there are several important details to remember that can help you streamline the setup process and reduce the risk of unnecessary errors when integrating Salesforce.
Apollo created a Salesforce Integration Checklist so you can quickly reference setup steps, workflows, and best practices. Use this checklist to ensure your CRM integration is set up for success.
Understand Salesforce Pull Settings
For paid Apollo plans, after you enable the Salesforce integration, there's a 6-hour window of time to configure push settings, configure pull settings, and map fields. This gives your team time to properly configure the integration.
During this time, you can't manually pull records. After 6 hours, syncing is automatically enabled.
Pull settings relate to how Apollo pulls data from your Salesforce instance. Apollo must always pull your leads, contacts, and accounts from Salesforce. This allows Apollo to remove any matches from the Apollo database. It also prevents your team from accidentally prospecting records in Apollo that already exist in Salesforce.
When Apollo identifies a lead and a contact for the same person in your Salesforce instance, Apollo always pulls the contact, not the lead. This is the only form of deduplication that Apollo runs against your Salesforce instance.
You can't disable the automatic pull feature for leads, contacts, and accounts, but you can hide them from view in Apollo. For more information, follow the steps in Configure Salesforce Pull Settings. To update the pull settings for Salesforce opportunities, check out Map Apollo Deals to Salesforce Opportunities.
Understand Salesforce Push Settings
Push settings relate to how Apollo pushes data from Apollo into your Salesforce instance. Unlike the pull settings, you can enable or disable Salesforce push settings for leads, contacts, and accounts.
You can choose whether to sync all your Apollo-sourced records with Salesforce. However, Apollo always syncs all Salesforce-sourced records with Apollo.
Avoid Duplicate Records
There are several key duplication rules to keep in mind before connecting Salesforce.
When you integrate Salesforce, Apollo mirrors the data in your Salesforce instance. If you have duplicate leads, contact, or accounts in Salesforce, these same duplicates reflect in Apollo too. To avoid duplicate records post-sync, clean and deduplicate your Salesforce instance before you integrate the 2 platforms.
If Apollo pulls a duplicate from Salesforce, Apollo displays a potential duplicate message on the contact or account's profile page to notify you. You can also identify the record creation source from the activity log.
When you manually create a duplicate record in Salesforce, Apollo automatically creates the same record. Likewise, if you enable the Salesforce push settings and create a duplicate record in Apollo, Salesforce creates the same record within your Salesforce instance.
Apollo does not automatically delete or merge the duplicates that you manually create. If you decide to delete or merge any of these records, you must do so manually.
Remove Duplicate Records
If duplicate records have already been synced from Salesforce to Apollo, you have 2 options for removing them:
- Delete: If you enable the appropriate settings in Apollo, you can delete duplicate records in either Apollo or Salesforce and the deletion will sync for both.
- Merge: If you enable the appropriate settings in Apollo, you can merge duplicate records in Salesforce and the changes will sync to Apollo. Once you merge a duplicate, Apollo will only sync information for the remaining record with Salesforce.
To change these settings:
- Launch Apollo and click Settings > Integrations.
- Click View next to the Salesforce integration.
- On the Salesforce integration page, select from Contacts, Leads, Accounts, or Deals, then click Sync.
- Click the checkboxes to enable deletion sync or merge sync.
If you pull duplicate records from Salesforce and then merge them in Apollo, Apollo does not merge them in Salesforce. To prevent the records from syncing again, either delete them or merge the duplicate in Salesforce.
Map Fields
If you decide to enable auto-fill or overwrite for mapped fields, keep the following in mind:
- When you enable Auto-fill, Apollo automatically uses information within the Apollo database to fill in the field from Salesforce. This only happens if a field is empty and Apollo has relevant information available.
- When you enable Overwrite, Apollo automatically overwrites the existing information in the field from Salesforce with the information within Apollo. This only happens if the information differs between the 2 platforms and Apollo has relevant information available.
Check out Map Default Apollo Fields in Salesforce to learn more about configuring auto-fill and overwrite settings for Salesforce. These settings only run when Apollo pulls information from Salesforce.
Manual actions always take precedence. If you manually enrich a field from the CRM Enrichment page, Apollo pushes that update even if you have disabled the utofill or auto overwrite setting for the field.
View Errors
Leverage the error log in Apollo to view any sync errors that Apollo receives from your Salesforce instance.
The error log only displays errors that Apollo receives when pushing information to Salesforce. These errors are responses from Salesforce, and they usually indicate a restriction on Salesforce's side, such as hitting a custom validation rule or rate limits for your connected instance.
If you are still unsure whether your data is syncing correctly, you can gain a more granular view of error sync history at the contact or account level.
Now that you know more about how the Apollo-Salesforce integration works, you're ready to set up the integration! Start by following the steps in Salesforce Credentials Overview.
Also, don't forget to check out the Salesforce section of the Knowledge Base for more info on all things Salesforce integration.
Auto-map Deal Stages
When you integrate Salesforce with Apollo, Apollo automatically creates a pipeline for deals with the same stages as your Salesforce opportunity stages, and deactivates the creation of new deal stages in Apollo. Check out Map Apollo Deals to Salesforce Opportunities for more information about the automatic stage mapping between Apollo deals and Salesforce opportunities, and manual field mapping between deals fields and Salesforce opportunity fields.