This blog series is separated into 3 separate blog posts.

Introduction

Welcome to the blog posts of the SAP CX Services Marketing Practice.

We are happy to share with you our experience around Marketing Business, Technology and Analytics.

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Background

For the majority of Hybris Marketing projects outbound E-Mail communication is one essential part of the project`s scope. On SAP Hybris Marketing Cloud we can aggregate and maintain data from multiple sources, but who guarantees the validity of E-Mail addresses collected from these sources?

To increase the quality of data, in respect to your E-Mail addresses, we have worked with Neverbounce, a service provider for real-time email verification and email cleaning services.

This blog post gives you an idea on how to validate your E-Mail addresses on SAP Hybris Marketing Cloud using the Neverbounce services.

The Iflow, designed on SAP Cloud Platform Integration is one approach how to solve and can be used as a reference. Nevertheless, this needs to be redesigned on a project basis.

SAP Hybris Marketing Cloud

SAP Hybris Marketing Cloud offers out-of-the-box inbound and outbound communication scenarios.

- SAP_COM_0003 – Marketing – Master Data Integration

- SAP_COM_0049 – Marketing – Campaign Open Channel Integration

SAP Cloud Platform Integration

On Cloud Integration, a custom Iflow is created.

- Sender: HTTP

- Receiver: OData

Neverbounce

Neverbounce offers three different APIs for validating E-Mail Addresses.

- Validate Single E-Mail addresses

- Validate a list of E-Mail addresses

- Analyze a list of E-Mail addresses (“Health Check”)

In this Blog Post,

the general approach and setup is described. Further, the configuration for sending Campaign Data to external system using Open Channel is described.

Technical Configuration Overview

SAP Hybris marketing Cloud

- Set up Communication between SAP Hybris Marketing Cloud and SAP Cloud Platform Integration
  - - Outbound: Open Channel
  - - Inbound: CUAN_IMPORT_SRV Odata Service

- Configure Open Channel (Enhancement, External Definition)

- Define a Target Group

- Create a Campaign

- Release Campaign via Open Channel

SAP Cloud Platform Integration

- Create and Configure Iflow

- Define authentication and authorization

Neverbounce

- Create a Neverbounce account

- Go through the API documentation

SAP Hybris Marketing Cloud – Release E-Mail addresses to be validated

Configure SAP Hybris Marketing Cloud Inbound Communication

For importing data using the OData Service for Master Data integration, configure an Inbound Communication Channel.

- Create a Communication System, pointing to you SAP Cloud Platform Integration tenant
  - - Define the SAP Cloud Platform Integration Host Name
  - - Define the Authentication Method for Inbound Communication.

- Create a Communication Arrangement Inbound Scenario
  - - Select the Communication System created before
  - - Select the Scenario SAP_COM_0003
  - - Depending on the Authentication option you use, you need to create a Communication User and assign the user to the Communication arrangement.

Inbound Communication Arrangement

Configure SAP Hybris Marketing Cloud Outbound Communication

First, you need to set up the communication between Hybris Marketing and other connected systems.

- Create (or re-use) a Communication System, pointing to you SAP Cloud Platform Integration (CPI) tenant
  - - Define the SAP Cloud Platform Integration Host Name
  - - Define the Authentication Method for Outbound Communication.

- Create a Communication Arrangement and define the Service URL for the Processing Outbound Service
  - - Disable the Service Status for Preprocessing and Postprocessing
  - - Select the Communication System created before
  - - Select the Scenario SAP_COM_0049
  - - Make sure that the Service URL is same like the Endpoint created on CPI tenant (will be created later on CPI)
  - - Add an Implementation ID with the Additional parameters (this will be created later with the Custom Fields and Logic)

- Depending on the Authentication option you use, you need to create a Communication User and assign the user to the Communication arrangement.

Outbound Communication Arrangement

Please refer to the Help SAP Documentation for additional information.

Doc. Communication Management: https://help.sap.com/viewer/fb8ec2c215f742a09041e8ff03636b88/1705%20500/en-US/2e84a10c430645a88bdbfa…

Configure an Open Channel

In the Custom Fields and Logic app, make the mandatory Adapter Enhancements for your Open Channel Implementation.

Minimal requirement is to define an Implementation ID which represents your Open Channel action. That action will be, once activated, available from the Campaign automation UI.

Define an Export Definition

In the Export Definition App, define a new Export Definition to be used for your Open Channel. The Export Definition provides you with a template for structuring the export of target group member data.

Custom Fields and Logic App

Custom Logic

Open Channel Integration: https://help.sap.com/viewer/fb8ec2c215f742a09041e8ff03636b88/1705%20500/en-US/ae804bd65fde45a4a12d56…

Adapt Enhancements: https://help.sap.com/viewer/fb8ec2c215f742a09041e8ff03636b88/1705%20500/en-US/dabcd5e18754410599bf46…

Export Definition: https://help.sap.com/viewer/b88f770e4b7c4ecead5477e7a6c7b8f7/1705%20500/en-US/f7f06d54b287e530e10000…

Release a Campaign

Since we’re using Open Channel to send data from Marketing Cloud to an external system. You need to create and release a campaign including the E-Mail addresses that need to be validated.

- In the Target Groups App, define a Target group

- In the Campaigns App, create a new campaign
  - - Add the Target Group from the previous step
  - - Add the Export Definition defined before

- When everything is set up and configured. Release the campaign to release the campaign data to be sent out to the external system.

Since we did not define an external system yet, the campaign will fail. You can restart the campaign in case errors occur.

Campaign Automation

Validate a list of E-Mail Addresses

To automate the procedure of validating E-Mail addresses, we use SAP Cloud Platform Integration, to build the message processing logic, for routing and transforming the message.

SAP Cloud Platform Integration is a service running on the SAP Cloud Platform.
https://www.sap.com/products/hana-cloud-integration.html

First, you need a SAP Cloud Platform Integration tenant and appropriate rights to access the tenant.
You can request a trial account for testing and learning purpose.
SAP Cloud Platform Integration Trial: https://blogs.sap.com/2013/10/22/sap-hana-cloud-integration-test-and-learn-more-about-sap-s-cloud-ba…

The diagram illustrated the general procedure for validating a list of E-Mail addresses with Neverbounce.

(This diagram is illustrative and not a technical documentation)