Marketing Cloud Growth Campaign Flows vs. Salesforce Flows

We know Flow as Salesforce’s automation engine, bringing incredible power to non-coder that they historically didn’t have. Flow also powers the automation behind Marketing Cloud Growth Edition too – including email sending. 

What’s more, this is the first appearance of what have been termed “non-admin flows”, a condensed-down interface to instruct Flow what to do without having to deal with all the nodes and elements. I say it’s the first, as no other product on the Salesforce platform has this yet. Essentially, marketers are now tapping into Flow. 

Introduction to Salesforce Campaign Flows

Flow is powering an interface that allows you to introduce email content, actions to apply to records when an event (such as an interaction) happens, and more. This is verging on a like-for-like comparison between Engagement Studio in Account Engagement, or Journey Builder in Marketing Cloud. Whether functionality such as Journey Builder’s goals, exit criteria, etc., has not had a timeline disclosed. 

Flow can wait in shorter increments such as minutes, which has been long-sought-after functionality when stitching together marketing journeys. 

Add branching logic with Decision elements. This means you create “yes/no” paths according to whether the lead/contact meets your set criteria when they reach that point in the marketing journey.

There are (at the time of writing) two types of Campaign Flows: Segment-triggered Flows, and Form-triggered Flows. So, what are the main differences between the Flows in Marketing Cloud Growth (i.e. Campaign Flow) and Salesforce Flows? 

1. Available Elements 

As this is a drilled down version of Flow (a.k.a. non-admin flows), there are some elements that are not available across the board. Wait and decision elements are perhaps the most key when working with marketing use cases. 

This table shows a comparison between Salesforce “admin” flows, and also what the two types of Campaign flows offer. 

*Only with Marketing Cloud Growth

Wait vs. Wait Until Event Elements

As the name suggests, you can set two types of wait periods. Without Marketing Cloud Growth, you’re only able to set a “Wait” period – a pause in literal terms, such as “wait for three days”. The “wait until event” will hold Leads/Contacts at that point, listening out for a command that would make the Lead/Contact eligible to move forward. This mirrors the behavior in Engagement Studio.  

2. User Access and Capabilities

This portion can come with some confusion. According to Salesforce’s Help documentation: “In Marketing Cloud Growth, campaign flow sharing is set to private by default. However, associated records, sharing rules, and manual sharing can also affect the flow’s visibility.” 

The assumption here is that Campaign flows that are created respect the “only I can see what I create” framework, unless additional sharing rules have been put in place, say for example, with you and your team.

3. Creating/Editing Campaign Flows

Again, as Marketing Cloud Growth’s campaign flows are a condensed version of Salesforce (admin) flows, the user interface is simplified. How you and other users access these flows will differ. 

• Salesforce (admin) flows: From Salesforce Setup, anyone with the permissions “View Setup” and “Manage Flow” can work with Salesforce (admin) flows. There are no sharing rules required for this type of flow. 
• Campaign flows: Launched and edited from the Campaign record. Users would typically use the Marketing app to locate and work with Campaigns (and Campaign flows). Looking back at point #2, this means that Campaign flows are more like records than an artifact in Salesforce Setup. 

Summary 

So, here we are – the first iteration of the non-admin flows in Salesforce concept – simplified interfaces to work with Salesforce Flow, targeting specific use cases. 

While the Flows that marketers will interact with when building campaigns are condensed-down, Marketing Cloud Growth Edition can be looped into more complex Flows. We’re looking forward to seeing more use cases built out for the non-admins flows. 

Any differences we’ve missed? Do let us know in the comments.

Resources

• Salesforce Flow Elements
• Marketing Cloud Growth Elements
• Tips for Planning and Creating Salesforce Sharing Rules
• Campaign Flow Sharing Settings