Salesforce How-To: Creating an Admin Email Alert for Soapbox Engage Leads Marked with Match Review

Follow the steps below to create an email alert workflow in Salesforce to alert an administrator in real-time that a Lead has been submitted but was not able to auto-convert because it had a fuzzy match in the database in needs to be reviewed and processed manually. If you do not need a real-time notification but would rather get a weekly alert of all stuck leads to convert in a batch, please see our tutorial on creating a scheduled report of stuck leads instead.

Estimated time: 30 minutes

There are two parts to every automated workflow in Salesforce: 1) a workflow rule that determines when the action should happen, and 2) details of the actual action itself (field update, email alert, task, outbound message). These actions can happen immediately or scheduled at a particular time. If this is your first workflow, we're so excited to get you started with this one example and see what you can come up with from here! Workflows are one of the most useful tools in a Salesforce admin's arsenal. You can find lots more information in the official documentation here. 

In this example, we're going to create an email alert workflow to notify a particular user that a Donation/Event/Petition lead has been flagged as having a potential match and needs manual review.

Step 1: Create your Admin Alert Email Template

1. Log in to your Salesforce account and click the Setup link in the top right of the page. If you don't see this link, contact your Salesforce administrator. 
2. In the left menu under Administer, navigate to Communication Templates > Email Templates. 
3. Click the "New Template" button. 
4. We're going to create a simple email in this case because it's just an admin alert, so choose the "Text" option.
5. Choose a Folder to store your email template in. We suggest creating one just for "Admin Alerts".
6. Check the "Available For Use" checkbox to make sure this template is considered active and is available for selection later when setting up our workflow action.
7. For the Template Name, enter text such as "Admin Alert: Fuzzy Match Lead". This will fill in the unique name also. Note that this is just for internal reference.
8. Leave the encoding as-is.
9. For the Description, enter text such as "This email template is used to notify admins when a Soapbox Engage lead could not be auto-converted because a fuzzy match was found and it needs manual review and processing."
10. For the Subject line, enter something such as "Engage Alert: New Stuck Lead". 
11. For the Email Body, enter text such as: 
    

    Dear {!User.FirstName}, 
    
    Uh oh! A Soapbox lead was not able to auto-convert because we found a fuzzy match in your Salesforce database. Please review the Lead details and convert manually using the link below. 
    
    Link: https://na17.salesforce.com/{!Lead.Id} 
    
    Why did this lead get stuck? 
    This lead was flagged because there is an existing contact in your database with the same First Name AND Last Name /OR/ First Name AND Email Address /OR/ Last Name AND Email Address.
    
    What do I do to convert this stuck Lead? 
    Please find detailed instructions on how to review and convert stuck leads at http://support.picnet.net/entries/21749911-Responding-to-Leads-marked-as-Match-Review-Needed. 
    
    Thanks,
    Soapbox Engage Bot

12. Click Save and move on to Step 2!

Step 2: Create a Workflow Rule & Action

1. If you have not done so already, log in to your Salesforce account and click the Setup link in the top right of the page. If you don't see this link, contact your Salesforce administrator. 
2. Using the left menu under Build, navigate to Create > Workflows & Approvals > Workflow Rules. 
3. Click the "Create New Rule" button. 
4. Choose the Lead object for this workflow rule.
5. Enter a Rule Name such as "Lead: Match Review Admin Alert"
6. Enter a Rule Description such as "This workflow rule is used to evaluate when a lead was not able to convert because it has a fuzzy match and was flagged for manual review by a staff member". 
7. Set the Evaluation Criteria to Evaluate the rule when a record is: "created, and any time it’s edited to subsequently meet criteria" (this means that the email alert will be triggered any time a Lead is created or edited to have the Match Review Checkbox field selected). 
8. For the Rule Criteria, use one of the following criteria below:
1. For Soapbox Donations, include the field "Lead: Donation Match Review Needed" equals "True"
2. For Soapbox Events, include the field "Lead: Registration Match Review Needed" equals "True"
3. For Soapbox Petitions, include the field "Lead: Petition Match Review Needed" equals "True"
9. If you are using more than one field above, adjust your Filter Logic to use the OR operator between each criteria (1 OR 2 OR 3). This makes sure you get an alert if any of the conditions are met and not all. 
10. Click Save & Next.
11. Now we've created the workflow rule and it's time to create our action! Because we want to send an email in this case, choose "New Email Alert" from the "Add Workflow Action" dropdown link. We're going to send this email alert immediately when this happens, so ignore the Time Trigger section below for this one. 
12. For the Description, enter text such as "Admin Alert: Lead Match Review Needed" (this will fill in the unique name)
13. For Email Template, choose the template you created in Step 1.
14. For Recipient Type and Recipients, choose User if you want the email to go to an existing Salesforce user and select the recipient from the displayed list. You can also enter up to 5 additional emails to receive the alert include emails that do not belong to Salesforce users if needed. 
15. For the From Email Address, choose an existing user account such as the account connected to your Soapbox Engage site or an organization-wide account if you prefer (find additional information on setting these up here).
16. Save. 
17. Back on your Workflow Rule screen, click the "Done" button as part of Step 3.
18. All that's left now is to Activate your rule! Take one last look and when ready, hit the "Activate" button. Any leads created that meet your criteria going forward will trigger your email alert to notify an admin.
19. Test and celebrate!