--- schema_version: "1" id: e402b46d848b91b9c900e368a63e84f6507e86401f53eb91465e2ec964a24089 title: Key Concepts collection: admin version: current locale: en-us portal_url: https://docs.salesforce.com/admin/current/en-us/mktg/264-0-0/mcae_mc_campaigns_key_concepts.md canonical_url: https://help.salesforce.com/s/articleView?id=mktg.mcae_mc_campaigns_key_concepts.htm&release=264.0.0&type=5 source_site: help.salesforce.com content_type: documentation content_hash: 9e61e934432008bd074754731ffdd853097782962a563fa996e94a7f36aef173 description: Before you start using next-gen campaign features, get familiar with key concepts and how functionality differs between Account Engagement and Marketing Cloud Next. products: - Marketing - Marketing Cloud Account Engagement release: "264" --- # Key Concepts Before you start using next-gen campaign features, get familiar with key concepts and how functionality differs between Account Engagement and Marketing Cloud Next.

Concept	How It Works	More Information
Data Management (Data 360)	Data 360 organizes and unifies data across Salesforce and external data sources. It ensures data continuity between Account Engagement and Marketing Cloud Next.	Prerequisites for Data 360 Trailhead: Get to Know Data 360 About Salesforce Data 360
Prospects and Unified Individuals	You can connect and sync prospect and email engagement data from Account Engagement to Data 360. However, the concept of a prospect in Account Engagement doesn’t directly translate to Marketing Cloud Next. In Marketing Cloud Next, you market to a unified individual profile, which is a consolidated record of multiple lead and contact records associated with the same individual. The unified profile ensures correct contact details for marketing activities and dictates proper behavior for consent and personalization, and so on.	Prerequisites for Using Data 360 Trailhead: Data and Identity in Data 360 Unify Source Profiles
Segmentation	Marketing Cloud Next uses segments to define the criteria for an audience and to group those individuals together. A segment is similar to a dynamic list in Account Engagement and uses the same process as Account Engagement to create segments via the Data 360 connector. If a segment in Marketing Cloud Next is set to run on a schedule, it behaves similarly to a dynamic list by adding and removing individuals based on the schedule.	Prerequisites for Using Data 360 Understanding Segmentation in Marketing Cloud
Consent	In Account Engagement, consent is managed at both the email level and the subscription or preference level. If a user opts out via email, they’re opted out of all email communication. In Marketing Cloud Next, consent is managed only at the subscription or preference level. If a user unsubscribes, they unsubscribe from the subscription but not from all email marketing. Because consent isn’t shared across Account Engagement and Marketing Cloud Next, you must export consent preferences from Account Engagement and then import them into Marketing Cloud Next.	Set Up Consent and Subscriptions Understanding Consent Concepts in Marketing Cloud Import Consent Data to Marketing Cloud
Promotional Emails	The content editing experience in Marketing Cloud Next uses a single design framework so that building content is familiar no matter what you’re creating. The same experience for creating an email is available in both Account Engagement and Marketing Cloud Next. You can also use emails built for Account Engagement in Marketing Cloud Next, but the inverse isn’t true. You can’t use emails built in Marketing Cloud Next with Account Engagement. Before an email is sent, the system checks for the latest consent for the selected subscription, similar to the behavior in Account Engagement.	Prepare Account Engagement Content for Campaigns in Marketing Cloud Create a Campaign and View Performance in Marketing Cloud Next Create an Email in Marketing Cloud Add Required Consent Details to Promotional Emails
Campaigns	In Account Engagement, a campaign tracks a prospect’s first touch. The campaign is set when a prospect first clicks a tracked link or lands on a tracked page. A prospect remains associated with that campaign and with only one campaign. You can change which campaign the prospect is associated with. In Marketing Cloud Next, a campaign is the central organizational structure for your marketing efforts. It organizes the audience, assets, and metrics for a specific marketing effort. Your journey begins with a campaign and ends with reviewing your campaign’s performance. We recommend using Marketing Cloud Next campaigns for multichannel messaging, including SMS, alongside your MCAE campaigns.	Create a Campaign and View Performance Enhance your Marketing with Marketing Cloud Campaigns
Automations and Flow Builder	Marketing Cloud Next uses Flow Builder to automate tasks such as content distribution and lead creation. An email send is a common starting point for marketing journeys. A wait step causes a flow to resume for a specified event or when a condition is met. A wait step roughly equates to an activity trigger in Engagement Studio. An event trigger (such as an email send or form submission) can kick off a complete journey. This functionality is like combining the Account Engagement features of automation rules and Engagement Studio in a single automation. Flows give you the ability to use trigger-based Engagement Studio programs. Account Engagement automation features are similar to these Flow Builder features in Marketing Cloud Next. Completion actions > Event-based triggers and flow actions Automation rules > Event-based triggers, decisions, and actions Engagement Studio criteria > Decisions Engagement Studio actions > Actions Engagement Studio activity triggers > Wait steps	Create a Campaign and View Performance How Campaigns and Flows Work Together Working with Campaigns and Flows
Scoring	Marketing Cloud Next provides a default scorecard to quantify the interest of a lead based on their tracked engagements. Scoring is implemented via Data 360 calculated insights. The score is displayed on the lead, contact, and account records. Leads and contacts are scored based on how engaged they are with your marketing efforts and how closely they resemble your ideal customer. You can customize default scoring rules and decide how engagement and fit scores factor into the overall marketing score for a lead or contact. You can use the engagement, fit, and overall marketing scores to build segments and create targeted content. When testing, keep in mind that scoring can take some time. We recommend validating multiple scenarios at a time.	View Campaigns and Campaign Performance Score People Based on Engagement and Fit in Marketing Cloud
Reporting	After you connect Account Engagement data to Data 360 and your marketing activities are synced, the next-gen reports include those events in its reporting. For example, as email engagement is ingested into Data 360, features like scoring and reporting, which depend on that activity type, begin to access those events.	View Campaigns and Campaign Performance Measure Success in Marketing Cloud
B2B Analytics for Marketers	B2B Analytics for Marketers brings Tableau Next-powered dashboards into Marketing Cloud Next so you can measure and act on your marketing performance without leaving the platform. Use the Account-Based Marketing (ABM) dashboard to track engagement and pipeline metrics for high-value target accounts, along with dashboards for pipeline tracking, marketing performance, and campaign attribution.	B2B Analytics for Marketers Set Up B2B Analytics for Marketers