Configure CRM entity association

Where to go: Company settings > Activity association

Associating activities such as calls and emails to your CRM entities provides proper context for your Gong activities. Once a Gong activity is properly associated, you will know who a call was made to, the company they work with and the deal the activity is for. As there can be several accounts or deals that a conversation can be associated with, you can customize and control the association logic so that the association is tailored to your specific CRM implementation.

To get the most accurate associations, make sure the configurations reflect how data is stored in your CRM. For example, if you don’t store the deal owner details in the CRM, set the deal owner to off.

Before updating your settings, test how those changes affect associations. For more details see Simulate activity association.

When you click Update settings:

• The settings are applied to new activities in Gong.

• Select Reassociate activities from the last 30 days. This may take up to 24 hours to update activities occurring in the last 30 days. When activities that were exported to the CRM are reassociated, they may be re-exported and associated with the new account or deal.

You can also apply new settings to a single call. In the Call page menu, select Apply association rules to this call.

Stages in CRM entity association

The stages of CRM entity association are:

1. Generating a list of accounts that could be associated with the activity: The account list includes:

   1. Accounts that a Gong activity participant, who is also a contact in the CRM, activity belongs to.

   2. Optional. Accounts of deals where the participant is defined as a contact role. This account may be different to the account the participant belongs to.

   3. Optional: Accounts with the same website domain as the participant’s email domain. This is selected by default and it recommended for cases where sales activities include participants that are still not contacts in the CRM

   4. Optional: Accounts that are related to the participant’s account, such as a parent account.

2. Identifying the account most likely to be associated with the activity: If more than one account is found, set how Gong should choose the correct account to associate with the activity.

3. Identifying the deals most likely to be associated with the activity: Once we have associated an account, set the parameters for how Gong should choose the correct deal to associate with the activity.

Viewing CRM entities in Gong

Once the association is made, we display the CRM objects, in all activities, such as on the call page, deals and accounts pages and deal insights.

Importance of CRM data accuracy

This algorithm allows for flexibility so that if the CRM hygiene is not complete, we will still be able to make accurate associations. However, there will still be scenarios where incorrect association could be made if CRM hygiene is not maintained.

Stage 1: Account association

CRM contacts are always associated with an account. Therefore, participants who are also CRM contacts have an associated account. We start by generating a list of those accounts. However, it’s possible that the correct account is different to the account the participant is associated with and therefore we provide options for expanding the list of accounts.

Note:

If you have multiple duplicate contacts in your CRM, we associate a maximum of two contacts to the activity.

Expand the account list

Select from the following to expand the list of accounts;

• Participant is a contact role in a different account: when selected, includes accounts that the participant is also defined as a contact role.

• Find accounts with participants email domain: If a participant’s email is [email protected] and there is an account whose website is www.acme.com, the account can be added to the list of accounts that can be associated with the activity

• Find participant’s related accounts: If the account has a related account, such as a parent account, include the related accounts in the list. When selected you must provide the field in the Account object which contains the referenced account.

Narrow down the account list

There might be a large number of accounts that are candidates for association with the activity. To avoid associating multiple accounts, we provide various options to narrow down the list of accounts.

The options are:

By account filters

Set up filters using CRM fields to filter accounts:

1. Click + Add filter and select the CRM field you want to base the filter on.

2. Choose Is or Is not to set whether the filter will include or exclude the account.

3. Enter the values relevant for the filter and click Apply.

4. Add more filters as necessary.

For example, exclude partner accounts by selecting the CRM field which contains the account type. Select Is not and then Partner.

Filter logic

There is no limit to the number of filters you can set up. The logic for the filters is:

1. Is filters are grouped together in an OR function so that all values set are used to build a list of which accounts to include in the association

2. Is Not filters are grouped together in an OR function so that all values set are used to build a list of which accounts to exclude from the association

3. To include an account for association, the account must be in the include (Is list) and must not be in the exclude (Is Not list).

By account owner

We assume that if an account owner is on the call, then that account should be associated with the activity. If you generally save the account owner details in your CRM, selecting this option will reduce the number of accounts associated.

1. If you toggle the account owner to on, select:

   1. Optional: If no account owner is a participant, other accounts can be associated with the activity.

   2. Mandatory: If no account owner is a participant, the activity won’t be associated with an account. Select this option if you maintain strong CRM hygiene and your account owners are always listed for the account.

2. If you toggle On, you must provide the name of the CRM field you store the account owner in.

If multiple accounts are still options

If multiple accounts can still be associated with the activity, for example, there is a call with two account owners participating, we provide two options for selecting a single account:

• Number of CRM contacts: Associates the account with more contacts participating in the activity. If out of two possible accounts, one account has 2 participants and the other has 4, select the account with 4 participants. If this is activated and there is a single account, we associate the activity to that account.

• Most recent CRM entry: Associates the account with the most recent entry in the CRM, such as the newer account, or the account with the most recent update. For this option select:

  • Date field for the most recent CRM entry: The date field in the CRM which you want to use to determine the most recent entry. For example, if you want to choose the newer account, select the date field which holds the account creation date.

  • Number of accounts to associate: At this stage if a single account can’t be chosen, you might prefer to associate the activity to all the accounts found, maximum of 10, or limit association to 1 account.

Stage 2: Deal association

Once we know which account the activity is associated with, we can identify deals which the activity may be related to. If you don’t want your activities associated with deals, click Disable to disable deal association.

Create a list of potential deals

The list of deals includes those that were open around the time the conversation took place. Identifying open deals is based on the value of two fields:

• deal status: set by the rep, indicates whether the deal is open or closed.

• deal close date: a rough estimate of when the rep expects the deal to close

If these fields aren’t maintained, there may be deals where the status is open and the close date was several weeks or months previous. In addition, conversations just before or after a deal is opened or closed may still be related to that deal.

Therefore, the list of potential deals to associate is made up of:

• Deals opened up to 14 days after the conversation took place

• Deals closed up to 14 days before the conversation took place

• Deals with a deal status of open but the close date field was up to 100 days before the conversation took place

This timeline shows when conversations might be associated with an opportunity based on the opportunity’s status and close date.

Narrow down the list of deals

The options to narrow down the list of deals are:

By deal filters

Set up filters to automatically include or exclude specific deals from being associated with activities as follows:

1. Click + Add filter and select the CRM field you want to base the filter on.

2. Select Is or Is not to set whether the filter will include or exclude the deal.

3. Enter the values relevant for the filter.

4. Add more filters as necessary.

For example, exclude renewals by selecting the CRM field which contains the deal type. Select Is not and then Renewal.

Filter logic

There is no limit to the number of filters you can set up. The logic for the filters is:

1. Is filters are grouped together in an OR function so that all values set are used to build a list of which deals to include in the association

2. Is Not filters are grouped together in an OR function so that all values set are used to build a list of which deals to exclude from the association

3. To include a deal for association, the deal must be in the include (Is list) and must not be in the exclude (Is Not list).

Choose whether to associate deals based on which activity participants also have a role in the deal.

By deal owner

We assume that if the deal owner is on the call, then that deal should be associated with the activity. If you generally save the deal owner details in your CRM, selecting this option will reduce the number of deals associated.

1. If you toggle Associate if deal owner is an activity participant to on, select:

   1. Optional: If no deal owner is a participant, other deals can be associated with the activity.

   2. Mandatory: If no deal owner is a participant, the activity won’t be associated with an account. Select this option if you maintain strong CRM hygiene and your deal owners are always listed for the account.

By deal contact

Deal contacts (known as contact roles in Salesforce) are contacts with roles who are defined and the primary contact for the deal. If you do not use contact roles in your CRM, set this to Off. If there are participants from several deals, we assume that if a deal contact is on the call, the call is predominantly related to that deal.

1. If you toggle Associate if deal contact is an activity participant to on, select:

   1. Optional: If no deal contact is a participant, other deals can be associated with the activity.

   2. Mandatory: If no deal contact is a participant, the activity won’t be associated with an account. Select this option if you maintain strong CRM hygiene and your deal contacts are always listed for the account.

2. If you toggle On, you must provide the CRM object you save your deal contact in.

By team members working on the deal

If there are team members participating in the call who work on one of the deals and this information is saved in the CRM, you may want to associate those deals with the activity.

1. If you toggle Associate if team member deal contact is an activity participant to on, select:

   1. Optional: If no deal contact is a participant, other deals can be associated with the activity.

   2. Mandatory: If no deal contact is a participant, the activity won’t be associated with an account. Select this option if you maintain strong CRM hygiene and your deal contacts are always listed for the account.

2. If you toggle On, you must provide the name of the CRM field you store the deal contact in.

If multiple deals are still options

• Number of CRM contacts: Associates the deal that has more contacts participating in the activity. If out of two possible deals, one deal has 2 participants and the other has 4, select the deal with 4 participants. If this is activated and there is a single deal, we associate the activity to that deal.

• Most recent CRM entry: Associates the deal with the most recent entry in the CRM, such as the newer deal, or the deal with the most recent update. For this option select:

  • Date field for the most recent CRM entry: The date field in the CRM which you want to use to determine the most recent entry. For example, if you want to choose the newer deal, select the date field which holds the deal creation date.

  • Number of deals to associate: At this stage if a single deal can’t be chosen, you might prefer to associate the activity to all the deals found, maximum of 20, or limit association to 1 deal.