Attribute values can be set within Totango, sent from API, or from other data files or data sources. Define additional settings for each attribute type.

Attribute source

Any attribute you add to Totango can come from the following source options:

• Salesforce: Set the attribute using legacy Salesforce connector (not common). Values cannot be updated from any other source (API or CSV). If attempted, Totango will ignore the data sent to this attribute.
• API: Set the attribute using all other sources, including non-legacy Salesforce connectors. Requires an API name, which cannot be changed once set. The API name is used when updating the attribute from another data file or data source.

Totango does not support special characters in the API name; only "-"  and underscore "_" are allowed.

Additionally you can enable Edibility in Totango if you want to allow your teams to change the attribute value from within Totango. If populating a value from another source, you may consider making an attribute read only in Totango.

Visibility

Control data visibility within account attributes:

• Privileged: Set account-level attributes, custom metrics, hierarchy roll-ups, or collections as privileged. Privileged data will only be visible on accounts within a team's core scope. In addition to attributes, optionally mark layout components of the account profile for privileged access (e.g., Contacts widget).
• Hidden: Set account-level attributes, custom metrics, or hierarchy roll-ups as hidden, such as deprecated or unused attributes over time. Hidden data will only be visible to Totango users with the "Attribute Visibility" permission (Permissions > Application Permissions > View hidden data).

Control sensitivity with user attributes:

• Sensitive: Set user-level attributes as sensitive. Sensitive data refers to personally identifiable information (PII) that you want to remove from visibility in Totango, except for global admins. Teams can still segment on user attributes that have been marked as sensitive. 

Default values

If you send data to Totango, you can set default values whenever empty values are synced to Totango. Default values apply to text, number, or date attributes (account object only).

Some common use cases for setting default values include:

1. Uploading usage aggregated information as attributes to Totango. Whenever there is no data for a certain account, custom metrics or segments criteria do not include the empty values.
2. Managing customer classifications as attributes in my CRM. Set the customer classifications attribute default value to "No Classification" if no value exists so that teams can sort by that value within segments.

On the other hand, there are several cases where you may want to keep the value empty. Totango will not override the empty values in these cases:

1. Empty Salesforce values will be kept empty in Totango to make it aligned with the source system
2. Empty values from Totango product integration (known as SDR)
3. Empty values via Customer Data Hub API

System default is set to "Previous value" for all allowed attribute data types (text, number, date). Optionally set to "Delete." For date attributes, you can additionally choose from "today" or set to a specific date.

User attribute default value behavior is "delete," which means that if the value is uploaded empty, it will be deleted for that record.

Best practice for scheduled uploads with a data file

Default value functionality can cause data irregularities if uploading via CSV file based on automated file creation. In such cases, an attribute can disappear when an empty cell is provided and will reappear when data becomes available. If the attribute is used for custom metrics, health or other segmentations, data might fluctuate and might seem incorrect.

We highly recommend handling cases where no value exists by setting up a default value according to your business logic case, if you do not wish to delete the attribute.