What if you had a hidden layer of customer insights at your fingertips, ready to fuel hyper-personalized campaigns? With Oracle Eloqua, you do. By leveraging Custom Data Objects (CDOs), you can enrich your customer data and transform every touchpoint into a personalized experience that drives engagement and growth.

What are Custom Data Object in Eloqua?

Custom Data Objects (CDOs) are flexible data structures that extend the standard capabilities of contact and account records. While Eloqua contact fields capture essential information like email, job title, or industry, CDOs allow you to store additional, highly specific information that matters to your business.

Think of CDOs as customizable sets of records designed to capture details such as:

• Event registrations
• Product interests
• Interaction history

By moving beyond static contact data, Eloqua CDOs enable you to build a more complete and actionable customer profile.

How CDOs Transform Customer Data?

Unlike traditional static fields, CDOs capture dynamic, behavioral data. For example, a CDO could track every webinar a contact attended, or which product categories they engaged with on your website. This enriched layer of insight allows for more advanced personalization and precise segmentation.

1. Advanced Segmentation

With Eloqua CDOs, you can segment audiences based on specific criteria beyond basic demographic data. This ensures that your campaigns are not only targeted but also deeply relevant to each contact’s behavior and preferences.

2. Enabling Personalization

CDOs provide richer context for tailoring messages. Instead of sending generic content, you can use CDO insights to deliver emails or landing pages that align with a prospect’s past interactions or interests. This level of personalization strengthens relationships, boosts engagement, and increases conversions.

Key Ways to Use Custom Data Objects

1. Field Merges with CDO Records

Merging CDO fields with existing contact records helps consolidate valuable information for advanced customization. By carefully selecting and integrating fields, marketers gain a holistic view of each customer while maintaining data integrity.

2. Dynamic Content with CDO Records

Dynamic Content in Eloqua allows you to show or hide content based on individual attributes or behaviors. By linking CDOs with Dynamic Content rules, your emails and landing pages adapt in real time to each recipient’s unique profile—making every communication more relevant.

3. Data Management and Scalability

CDOs simplify data management by offering structured, customizable storage. As your organization grows, you can easily add new fields or create custom objects without overhauling your database. To maximize effectiveness, regularly audit and update your CDOs to maintain high data quality.

How to Create a Custom Data Object in Eloqua

Setting up a CDO in Eloqua is straightforward:

• Navigate to Audience > Custom Objects > New Custom Object.
• Name your object and define its fields.
• Add standard contact fields, form fields, or entirely new custom fields.
• Use CDOs in segmentation by applying filters such as “Has Linked Contact in Custom Object.”
• Create field merges and dynamic content rules to extend personalization.

This flexibility allows you to capture and apply data that reflects the unique needs of your business.

Reporting with CDOs

Eloqua also enables direct export of filtered lists from CDO records, making it easier to prepare reports without relying solely on Insight. For example, you can analyze performance for a specific event or product interest group, gaining actionable insights for optimization.

Final Thoughts

In today’s data-driven marketing environment, Eloqua Custom Data Objects are a game-changer. They unlock advanced personalization, enable dynamic segmentation, and simplify scalable data management. With CDOs, marketers can:

• Go beyond static fields to capture rich behavioral data
• Deliver personalized campaigns that resonate with each prospect
• Strengthen customer relationships through relevant interactions
• Gain deeper insights with flexible reporting

By integrating CDOs into your Eloqua strategy, you’ll not only improve campaign effectiveness but also create meaningful experiences that drive long-term engagement and growth.