Updating block and exclusion lists

When to use this guide: Use this guide when configuring or validating CRM integration behavior.

With OutboundSync, you can have any Salesforce report function as a blocklist or exclusion list, depending on which sales engagement platform you’re using. You also know of these as Do Not Contact (DNC), opt out, or suppression lists.

These lists ensure that cold outreach is not sent to existing customers, competitors, open deals, or contacts on Do Not Contact lists.

Read about the difference between block lists and exclusion lists here.

Creating your report in Salesforce

OutboundSync uses Salesforce reports as a source for the block or exclusion list in Salesforce. The benefit of this is that Salesforce’s reporting engine is highly configurable and adaptable.

Understand the API limitations: The first step is understanding that the reports API only allows us to pull up to 2,000 rows and we use the date stamp for each row to distinguish newly added results from the previous day. In practice, this means you can block up to 2,000 rows of email addresses or domains per day per report. If a row (e.g. an account or contact) has multiple email addresses or multiple domains associated with it, they can all be included. If your list starts with more than 2,000 rows, consider a one-time initial pull from Salesforce directly to your Sales Engagement Platform. Then add a date filter to capture data moving forward. If your list also adds more than 2,000 rows per day, consider breaking it up into multiple smaller lists.

If you don’t have a blocklist built yet, let’s create one now. Otherwise, skip ahead.

Need inspiration? Popular examples include lists for channel partners, open opportunities, and active customers.

Build a new report by going to Salesforce > Reports

Open Salesforce Reports and create a report for the records you want to block.

Now go ahead and set whatever filters and criteria you want in-place for your report.

Here’s an example report that uses the website field in Salesforce:

Include the email or website fields OutboundSync should send to your block list.

Keep in mind a few things:

• We’ll be creating a list that includes either email addresses or domains as one of the fields.
• In the case of email addresses, we can either do a 1:1 matching block, or we can extract the domain of that email address and block the entire domain.
• If contacts have multiple email fields in Salesforce, include all those email properties in your report and we will use those later.
• Finally, make sure to label your report with a clear name so you can find it quickly.

Pulling your block list into OutboundSync

Now that you have created your list in Salesforce, we need to pull that list into OutboundSync to start dynamically updating it in your Sales Engagement Platform. For this, we’ll need to return to OutboundSync.

Remember that the user performing these actions needs to have sufficient permissions. If the user cannot access this data in the CRM, their credential cannot be used by OutboundSync to perform this action.

Navigate to OutboundSync block lists

Now, go to the OutboundSync app and go to the Block lists tab on the left.

Open Block lists to configure a new list and monitor existing syncs.

Select your profile

Select the Salesforce Connected App that you want to use as the source for your block list. This is based on the user who installed the Connected App when you first set up your OutboundSync account.

Select a list/report

This is the one you just created earlier. If you don’t see it, make sure you have permissions to access to the report in question.

Select the Salesforce account and report that contain the records to block.

Select fields

Select which fields specifically you want to be included in your block list. Remember that the type of field will need to match up with type of blocking you want to do.

Select Sales Engagement Platform API Key

Select the API key for the Sales Engagement Platform that you want to send to the block list. If you want to block this list on multiple platforms, create multiple lists.

Choose the report fields, destination platform, API key, and client.

Select type of blocking

OutboundSync supports two types of blocking. You can block by address or by domain with the Type of Blocking.

Address (Individual Email Address)

Blocks each email associated with a contact in Salesforce individually and adds it to the blocklist in your Sales Engagement Platform.

Example: Blocking john@example.com doesn’t block all emails ending in @example; only John’s email is blocked.

Domain (Every Email Address)

Blocks all emails associated with a contact’s domain and adds the domain to the blocklist in your Sales Engagement Platform.

If a contact had multiple email addresses, every domain would be blocked.

Exception: Leading email providers (e.g., Gmail, Outlook) won’t be blocked as they are common. View unblockable domains list here. If you want to block these domains manually in your Sales Engagement Platform, download this CSV and import it directly. This would block you from emailing personal email addresses.

Domain blocking extracts and blocks the domain from each selected report value.

Select clients (Optional)

If you are using a Sales Engagement Platform that has specific client IDs like Smartlead, this is the step where you will select that Client ID to match the blocklist to that client. Others use dedicated workspaces where this will not be relevant.

Live field preview

Once you select a Salesforce list source, at least one field, a Sales Engagement Platform (Smartlead, Instantly, EmailBison, or HeyReach), and a type of blocking, the Live field preview panel loads under the form. It is marked Auto and refreshes when those choices change.

Use Preview field to choose which of your selected fields to sample. Preview shows one field at a time; OutboundSync still blocks using every field you selected when you start.

The table has two columns: Field Selected (the value from the Salesforce report) and a platform result column such as Smartlead Result. Included rows show the mapped value that would be sent to your platform. Skipped rows show why they will not be blocked — for example, an empty source value, no email or domain found, a common inbox domain skipped, or no profile URL detected.

Preview samples about 10 report rows. It does not require an API key and does not block you from clicking Start Blocking — review the sample, then continue.

Review mapped values and skip reasons before starting the block-list sync.

Start blocking

Next, click Start Blocking (6). You will see your blocklist appear in the table.

The new Salesforce block list appears with its destination, progress, and current status.

This takes time to execute. The larger your list, the more time it can take. Refresh your browser or come back later to see OutboundSync’s progress updating your blocklist.

Next step

• Run a webhook test payload