Migrate from Adobe Marketo Engage to Microsoft Dynamics 365 Sales

Marketo Persons (internally called Leads) carry a lifecycle stage property (subscriber, lead, MQL, SQL, customer) that determines routing. Persons with lifecycle stage of subscriber through MQL map to Dynamics 365 Lead. Persons already at SQL or customer stage with an existing company association map to Dynamics 365 Contact attached to an Account. We compute the split using the Marketo lifecycleStage field during migration and preserve the original value in mkto_original_lifecycle__c on both Lead and Contact for audit and reporting continuity.

Marketo Company records map directly to Dynamics 365 Account. The Company domain field becomes the Account Website. Company annual revenue, employee count, industry, and address fields map to their Account equivalents. Account is created before any Person or Contact import so that the ParentAccount lookup is satisfied at insert time. If the Marketo instance uses the native Dynamics CRM sync, Company records are derived from Dynamics and we coordinate the Account creation with the customer's CRM admin to avoid overwriting live CRM data.

Marketo Opportunity records (synced from Dynamics when the native connection is active) map back to Dynamics 365 Opportunity. The Opportunity name, amount, close date, stage, and owner fields migrate directly. Marketo's opportunity type and custom opportunity fields migrate as Dynamics Opportunity custom fields. If the opportunity is linked to a Marketo Person, we resolve the Person-to-Lead/Contact mapping and attach the Opportunity to the correct Contact via the OpportunityContactRole.

Marketo Programs (Email, Event, Engagement, Default) map to Dynamics 365 Campaign as a container artifact. The Program name, channel, period cost, tags, and channel assignment migrate as Campaign metadata (Campaign Name, Type, Budgeted Cost, Actual Cost). Program membership — the list of Persons enrolled in each Program — migrates as CampaignMember records linking the appropriate Leads or Contacts to the Campaign. We do not migrate Program assets (email templates, landing pages, forms) as these require rebuild in the destination MAP.

Marketo Custom Objects (one-to-many via a single link field, or many-to-many via an intermediary object) migrate to Dynamics 365 custom entities with lookup fields referencing the parent Lead, Contact, or Account. For many-to-many relationships, we create a junction entity with two lookup fields. The Marketo custom object fields (up to 50 per object) map to Dynamics custom fields with equivalent data types. We pre-create the Dynamics custom entity schema and all field definitions before any data import.

Form fill data lives as Filled Out Form activity records in Marketo, not as fields on the Person record. We extract these via the Marketo Activity API endpoint, not from Person record exports, preserving the full form submission history (form name, field values, submission timestamp) per Person. In Microsoft Dynamics 365 Sales , this data lands in a custom Activity entity or as Note records on the Lead/Contact with the form name and field values in the Note body. We flag this explicitly because Smart List exports from Marketo capture only current Person field values and miss the form submission event history entirely.

Marketo behavioral activities (email opens, email clicks, web page visits, link clicks) migrate as custom activity records attached to the Lead or Contact. Microsoft Dynamics 365 Sales does not have a native behavioral tracking model — its Activity types (Tasks, Emails, Appointments, Phone Calls) cover sales activities, not marketing behavioral events. We store these as custom Activity records in a dedicated mkto_activity entity with activity type, timestamp, and detail fields so the marketing attribution history is available for reporting.

Marketo Static Lists hold a fixed set of Person records. We migrate Static List membership as a custom multi-select picklist on Lead/Contact (list names as values) or as CampaignMember records under a static Dynamics Campaign. The customer chooses the representation during scoping. List performance metrics (send, open, click rates) are not migratable as data because they are computed aggregates in Marketo, not raw records.

Marketo Engagement Programs with up to 25 Streams and 125 content items per Stream are Marketo-specific artifacts with no direct Dynamics 365 equivalent. We extract the stream structure, content item assignments, and cadence as structured metadata in a JSON inventory document. The customer's marketing team uses this document to rebuild Engagement Programs as Dynamics 365 Marketing Customer Journeys or in their chosen replacement MAP. This is a manual rebuild step outside the data migration scope.

Marketo Smart Campaign logic — Smart List filters, trigger conditions, and flow steps — is extracted as structured metadata and delivered in a written inventory document. The trigger conditions, filter logic, and action types are documented with recommended Dynamics 365 Marketing equivalents. Smart Campaigns that use CRM field updates (changing Lead status, creating tasks in Dynamics) are flagged for admin review because Dynamics handles these through workflows and business rules rather than campaign flow steps.