B2B lead generation
Marketing automation sync
Both the automation platform and the CRM hold a source field, and whichever one writes last wins, so first touch is quietly replaced by the most recent interaction and the acquiring campaign disappears.
Paid, fixed scope · Within ten business days after complete access
What breaks
Marketing automation platforms syncing to a CRM, two systems that both hold a source field, and any stack where a lead record is written by more than one tool
When two systems each maintain their own idea of where a lead came from and a sync runs between them, the sync has to decide which value survives. Most are configured, by default rather than by decision, to let the more recent write win. So a lead acquired by a paid campaign in spring, nurtured by email, and re-engaged in autumn, ends up sourced to the autumn email. Nothing is lost visibly. The field is populated and the report renders. The number is wrong in a specific and consistent direction: it systematically credits late-funnel touches that talk to people already in the database, and systematically starves the top-of-funnel spend that put them there.
Why nobody catches it
The overwrite is invisible because the field is never empty. There is no null to notice and no moment where the old value is shown beside the new one. Sync behaviour is also configured once during implementation, often by a vendor, and then treated as infrastructure rather than as a reporting decision, which is exactly what it is. The team most affected by it, the one buying top-of-funnel media, has no access to the setting and frequently does not know it exists.
The work
The sync direction and overwrite behaviour documented, first and most recent touch held separately, and a real record showing first touch surviving a return visit.
- 01Establish which system writes the source field, in which direction, and which value wins, by reading the sync configuration rather than the documentation
- 02Separate first touch from most recent touch into two fields that cannot overwrite each other
- 03Set first touch to write once and never update, and confirm that with a real record over a real return visit
- 04Rebuild the channel report on the field that answers the question being asked, rather than on whichever field was already there
Elsewhere in lead generation and crm
One stack usually has more than one of these.
These boundaries compound. A brand running a hosted checkout and a subscription plan has two separate reasons for its channel report to be wrong, and fixing one leaves the other in place. The audit establishes which are live on your stack before anything gets rebuilt.
Start with the smallest useful check
Send one account running automation and crm sync and we will read its setup before anyone signs anything.
Send the domain, the customer journey, and the platforms that should receive it. The tracking audit shows what is working, what is missing or duplicated, and the exact build recommended next.
Paid, fixed scope · Within ten business days after complete access