In today’s blog I would like to present a way how to synchronize Marketo with major CRMs and ERPs like Dynamics CRM, Salesforce, SugarCRM, Dynamics AX, NAV. The benefits of integrating Marketo and other business systems have been discussed in our previous blog. I will demonstrate the synchronization using a showcase between two different target systems (Marketo and Dynamics CRM) with the use of simple SQL statements. For this purpose I will be using Connect Bridge and its Marketo and Dynamics CRM connectors.

Why to use Connect Bridge?

Usually in order to be able to communicate with 2 different target systems, in our case a MS Dynamics CRM server and Marketo, the developer would need to know the API of each target system. This requires some studying of the API in order to understand how they work and how to write the source code in order to be able to do the same process that we are going to demonstrate later in this blog.

With the use of Connect Bridge and its Marketo and CRM connectors, the time necessary to understand and to be able to successfully implement the solution is significantly reduced. The main difference is that Connect Bridge allows the developer to use simple SQL statements to communicate with each target system. This is not possible when using the API of the target system itself because of different schemas and architectures used to develop the target system. Connect Bridge also allows connection to multiple target systems at the same time by using the available connectors. For more information about Connect Bridge visit the web page.

What do we need?

Firstly we will need credentials to connect to MS Dynamics CRM and Marketo. As we are going to be using Connect Bridge, we will need a running Connect Bridge server with CRM and Marketo connectors.

For our demonstration, let’s assume that accounts for Marketo and Dynamics CRM were already created in the Connect Bridge server. The user credentials for each target system are used during the setup of each account so the Connect Bridge knows what credential to use when communicating with the target system (Dynamics CRM credentials for communication with Dynamics CRM and Marketo credentials for communication with Marketo).

For demo purposes we will use Visual studio, where we create a simple console application that will do the synchronization.

We are going to use Connect Bridge query analyzer tool to demonstrate the SQL statements and the output that is returned by the Connect Bridge server.

The solution

The console application

First we need to create new console application where we do our coding. Go to File – New – Project and choose a console application.