Why Clearing Pardot - Salesforce Sync Errors Is Critical for Marketing Success
Marketing and sales alignment drives revenue. When Pardot (Marketing Cloud Account Engagement) and Salesforce aren’t syncing correctly, things break fast. What looks like a “minor” sync error can quietly create messy data, derail campaigns, frustrate sales teams, and ultimately cost you pipeline. If you’re not actively monitoring and fixing these issues, your marketing automation isn’t working as hard as you think.
1. Protect Your Lead Data (and Your Reputation)
When sync errors occur, prospect data doesn’t make it into Salesforce the way it should. Field data goes missing, records get outdated, and duplicates start piling up. For marketers, that means bad segmentation, irrelevant messaging, and a brand experience that feels sloppy instead of intentional. Clean data isn’t optional, it’s what ensures your campaigns reach the right people at the right time.
2. Ensure Accurate Reporting and ROI Measurement
Marketing teams rely on Salesforce data to prove impact. When sync errors occur, lead attribution breaks, lifecycle stages may become wrong, and reports become unreliable. Clearing sync errors restores trust in your reporting ensuring you can confidently show how marketing contributes to pipeline and revenue.
3. Improve Sales and Marketing Alignment
When Pardot and Salesforce are out of sync, sales misses signals that matter. Hot leads slip through the cracks, follow-ups happen with incomplete data, and response times slow down. Fixing sync errors ensures sales sees the same up-to-date prospect activity that marketing does, creating a cleaner handoff, better conversations, and a smoother customer experience.
4. Maximise Automation and Personalisation
Pardot automation rules, dynamic lists, and Engagement Studio programs all depend on clean, synced data. When sync errors occur, automations break or prospects get left out of journeys entirely. Fixing these issues quickly keeps your marketing automation running efficiently and your personalisation doing what it’s supposed to do.
5. Future-Proof Your Marketing Operations
Ignoring sync errors lets technical debt pile up. Small issues turn into major clean-up projects faster than you expect. Proactive error management keeps Pardot and Salesforce aligned, which in turn keeps Marketing and Sales aligned.
Here are the most common Salesforce - Pardot sync errors and typical fixes;
Field & Data Errors
✖️ Required Field Missing ✖️
Error example:
Required fields are missing: LastName
Why it happens
Salesforce has required fields (often on Lead/Contact) that Pardot isn’t populating
Fix
Make the field required in Pardot too, or set a default value via completion actions or automation rules
✖️ Field Length Exceeded ✖️
Error example:
Value too large for field: Company
Why it happens
Pardot allows longer text than Salesforce.
Fix
Shorten values in Pardot or increase field length in Salesforce (if possible)
✖️ Invalid Field Value ✖️
Error example:
Bad value for restricted picklist field
Why it happens
Pardot sends a value that doesn’t exist in a Salesforce picklist
Fix
Align picklist values exactly in both systems
Permission & Access Errors
✖️ Insufficient Access Rights ✖️
Error example:
Insufficient access rights on cross-reference id
Why it happens
The Pardot connector user doesn’t have permission to create/update the record
Fix
Check Salesforce object permissions, field-level security, and record ownership
Sync Configuration Issues
✖️Prospect Assigned to Wrong User ✖️
Why it happens
The assigned Salesforce user is inactive or not synced with Pardot
Fix
Reassign the prospect to an active, synced Salesforce user
Email & Identity Errors
✖️ Invalid Email Address ✖️
Error example:
Invalid email address format
Why it happens
Badly formatted email (spaces, missing domain, etc.)
Fix
Clean the email data in Pardot before sync and/or add character validation to the field in Salesforce
When resolving sync errors it’s important to check on the field sync behaviour, the options will be;
| Option | Description |
|---|---|
| Always use Pardot’s value | Pardot always pushes its value to Salesforce, even if Salesforce already has a value. |
| Always use Salesforce’s value | Salesforce always overwrites Pardot. |
| Use most recently updated value (default “sync behavior”) | The field is updated based on the most recent modification in either system. |
Need help resolving Pardot–Salesforce sync errors? Click the contact here to send me a note.
