Articles in this section

See more

Salesforce connector

  • Updated
Follow

Etlworks Salesforce connectors provide fast, real-time access to Salesforce data. They support all standard and custom objects, as well as metadata (fields), available through the Salesforce API. Functionally, they work just like any other connector for a connected app—simple to configure and fully SQL-enabled.

Salesforce vs. Salesforce Legacy Connectors

Etlworks includes two connectors for Salesforce:

  • Salesforce: This is the modern, premium connector that uses the latest Salesforce REST APIs. It supports advanced operations such as SELECT, INSERT, UPDATE, DELETE, and MERGE. It also enables interactive OAuth2 authentication using Sign in with Salesforce, making setup easy and secure. Learn more about premium connectors.

  • Salesforce Legacy: This connector uses the older SOAP API and supports basic operations like SELECT and INSERT. It does not support UPDATE, DELETE, MERGE, or OAuth2 authentication. However, it is completely free to use and may be suitable for simple read/write integrations.

Choose the connector that best fits your functional and security requirements.

When to use Salesforce connectors

Use Salesforce connectors to build flows that read from or write to Salesforce data. It’s ideal for integrating Salesforce with databases, files, APIs, or other connected apps.

Read how to work with data in Salesforce. 

Alternative: Free API Connector

In addition to native connectors, Etlworks also offers a generic API Connector that can be used to connect to this platform via its public API. The API connector is free and is a good alternative when the native connector doesn’t support a specific feature or if you prefer working directly with the API.

Prerequisites

You must have a Salesforce account. Sign up free if you don't have an account yet. 

Create a Connection

Step 1. In the Connection, window click +, and type in salesforce. 

Step 2. Select either Salesforce or Salesforce Legacy.

Step 3. Enter the Connection parameters.

Salesforce connector

  • Starter
  • Business
  • Enterprise
  • On-Premise
  • Add-on

Etlworks partnered with CData to provide access to the Salesforce API using industry-standard JDBC protocol. Read about CData Salesforce JDBC connector. 

The Salesforce connector supports secure, interactive OAuth2 authentication through Salesforce’s web-based login flow—allowing users to authenticate without exposing their credentials. It supports advanced operations such as SELECT, INSERT, UPDATE, DELETE, and MERGE, works with all standard and custom objects, and provides full access to Salesforce metadata. You can query and manipulate data using SQL-92 syntax, including JOINs and filtering.

Important: This is a premium connector, so please contact support@etlworks.com to enable it for your account.

Available parameters

  • Connect to sandbox account: enable this property to connect to a Salesforce sandbox account. Append the sandbox name to the end of the user name. For example, if your user name is user, and sandbox name in Salesforce is sandbox, the specified User should appear as user.sandbox
  • OAuth Token: token for authentication in Salesforce. Click Login with Salesforce, and log in to Salesforce website in the opened browser window. OAuth token will be generated automatically.
  • Other Parameters: optional parameters as key=value pairs. Read about optional Connection parameters. 

Salesforce Legacy Connector

This free connector requires a username, password, and a Salesforce security token for authentication. It uses legacy Salesforce SOAP API and does not support advanced features available for Salesforce connector:

  • Authentication with Oauth2 (Login with Salesforce).
  • UPDATE.
  • UPSERT (MERGE)
  • DELETE.

Available parameters

  • Login URL: the URL you use to log in to Salesforce (not the same as your Salesforce instance URL).
  • User: the email address of the Salesforce user.
  • Password: the password (do not append security token to the password).
  • Security Token: the security token. Read what a Salesforce security token is and how to find it.
  • Other Parameters: optional parameters as key=value pairs. Read about optional Connection parameters.

Work with Salesforce 

MERGE (UPSERT) with Salesforce

When loading data into Salesforce, the connector supports MERGE — insert new records or update existing ones in a single step (commonly called UPSERT). MERGE uses an external ID field or record ID to determine whether a record already exists.

Note: MERGE works only with the premium Salesforce connector. Salesforce Legacy does not support it.

To configure:

  1. Create a flow where the destination is a Salesforce connection.
  2. In the transformation, click MAPPING and switch to the Parameters tab.
  3. Set Action to CUSTOM.
  4. Enter a comma-separated list of field names in Lookup Fields to identify a unique record. Or enable Predict Lookup Fields for automatic detection.
  5. Enter the UPSERT template in the Destination query field, for example: 
    UPSERT INTO LocationToUse ({COLUMNS}, ExternalIdColumn)
VALUES ({VALUES}, '{KEYS}')

Tokens in the destination query:

  • {COLUMNS} — comma-separated list of columns
  • {VALUES} — values for the columns
  • {KEYS} — the lookup fields

Related articles