Work with Extensibility Features

Extensibility features include external activities and external actions. These tools help streamline workflows and automate tasks by connecting third-party apps to Account Engagement. External activities feed prospect activity data into Account Engagement where it can be used in automations. External actions can be used in Engagement Studio programs to execute actions in a third-party app.

Before you start, familiarize yourself with these features by reviewing Automate Data Sharing with Third-Party Apps.

Create a marketing app extension in Account Engagement Setup for each third-party app you work with. For each extension, add external activities and actions as needed. Activity-type and action-type objects represent external activities and actions, respectively. Each extension is associated with a business unit.

The steps to configure an external activity and an external action are different, but some preliminary steps are the same for both types.

To set up marketing app extensions and related activity type and action type records via the API, set up Salesforce OAuth and authenticate to Tooling API. For general information about setting up OAuth, see Authentication. For more information about the authentication methods for each feature, see External Activity and External Actions.

Marketing app extensions, which include action types for external actions and activity types for external activities, can be packaged. A managed package lets admins install an extension from AppExchange with the click of a button. If you’re a third-party service and building a generic integration, consider creating a managed package with the connected app. Make sure the marketing app extensions you create have unique and identifiable names.

Use Tooling API to set up the extension and activity types metadata. In this guide, we use the REST Tooling APIs.

We recommend that when your customer’s Salesforce Admin runs the setup that they run it without persistent authentication and name a different user for execution. Don’t create a business-unit assignment for packaged extensions. The end user of your integration must create the business-unit assignment. We also recommend that you leave all packaged components for automations deactivated.

Keep these considerations in mind when working with marketing app extensions and related objects.

  • Before you work with extensibility features, review the considerations in Automate Data Sharing with Third-Party Apps.
  • To use Tooling API, you must be a Salesforce admin. You can also set up a Marketing admin user that has access to Tooling API. See Designate an Admin for Marketing Setup Tasks.
  • You can create marketing app extensions, activity types, and action types using Tooling API or in Marketing Setup in Salesforce.
  • External activities aren’t available for packaging, but they can be configured using Tooling API.
  • To use external activities and external actions in automations, the marketing app extension and activity or action type must be marked active for automations. The marketing app extension must also be assigned to the correct business unit.