---
schema_version: "1"
id: 7254be4b6fa2840d960fddb9002d6679bab04693643c7c665ab6dfd7e5dd6505
title: Associate Event Data with a Contact
collection: developer
version: current
locale: en-us
portal_url: https://docs.salesforce.com/developer/current/en-us/marketing-cloud/guides/mc-apis/associate_event_data_with_a_contact.md
canonical_url: https://developer.salesforce.com/docs/marketing/marketing-cloud/guide/associate_event_data_with_a_contact.html
source_site: developer.salesforce.com
content_type: documentation
content_hash: fd71f33cc61d316ad2bdb2dfe9a7833c7c5a7928704d74a313da451695e6a39f
products:
  - Marketing Cloud Engagement APIs and Programmatic Languages
  - Marketing Cloud
---
# Associate Event Data with a Contact

An event is the collection of behavioral data that describes either an action a customer has taken or something that has happened to the customer. Examples of actions a customer has taken are opening an email, subscribing to a newsletter, participating in a survey, making a purchase, or calling in to a call center. Events that happen to a customer include things like having an email sent to them, being included in a direct mail campaign, receiving a call from a rep. All of the data that is collected about customer events is organized and related back to the contact record in Contact Builder. The event data can be used for filtering, personalization and driving customer journeys.

Use this sample SOAP envelope with the ContactEvent object to associate event data with a contact. To batch multiple items in a single request, include multiple objects that each contain data. Don't include multiple AttributeSets in one object.

## Sample SOAP Envelope

```
<SOAP-ENV:Envelope xmlns:SOAP-ENV="http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/envelope/" xmlns:xsd="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance">
 <SOAP-ENV:Header>
  <wsse:Security xmlns:wsse="http://docs.oasis-open.org/wss/2004/01/oasis-200401-wss-wssecurity-secext-1.0.xsd" xmlns:wsu="http://docs.oasis-open.org/wss/2004/01/oasis-200401-wss-wssecurity-utility-1.0.xsd">
   <wsu:Timestamp>
    <wsu:Created>2016-09-02T13:42:09Z</wsu:Created>
    <wsu:Expires>2016-09-02T13:47:09Z</wsu:Expires>
   </wsu:Timestamp>
   <wsse:UsernameToken>
    <wsse:Username>xxxxxxxxx</wsse:Username>
    <wsse:Password Type="http://docs.oasis-open.org/wss/2004/01/oasis-200401-wss-username-token-profile-1.0#PasswordText">xxxxx</wsse:Password>
    <wsse:Nonce EncodingType="http://docs.oasis-open.org/wss/2004/01/oasis-200401-wss-soap-message-security-1.0#Base64Binary">cs5vIFv5flSerLrzOy0AqCtVBrY=</wsse:Nonce>
    <wsu:Created>2016-09-02T13:42:09Z</wsu:Created>
   </wsse:UsernameToken>
  </wsse:Security>
 </SOAP-ENV:Header>
 <SOAP-ENV:Body>
  <CreateRequest xmlns="http://exacttarget.com/wsdl/partnerAPI">
   <Options>
     <RequestType>Synchronous</RequestType>
   </Options>
   <ns1:Objects xmlns:ns1="http://exacttarget.com/wsdl/partnerAPI" xsi:type="ns1:ContactEvent">
    <ns1:PartnerKey xsi:nil="true" />
    <ns1:ModifiedDate xsi:nil="true" />
    <ns1:ObjectID xsi:nil="true" />
    <ns1:EventDefinitionKey>externalkeyforprods4</ns1:EventDefinitionKey>
    <ns1:Data>
     <ns1:AttributeSet>
      <ns1:PartnerKey xsi:nil="true" />
      <ns1:ModifiedDate xsi:nil="true" />
      <ns1:ObjectID xsi:nil="true" />
      <ns1:Name>2015-06 Event to Group DE</ns1:Name>
      <ns1:Items>
       <ns1:Item>
        <ns1:Values>
         <ns1:Value>
          <ns1:Name>ContactKey</ns1:Name>
          <ns1:Value>MultiObjects1</ns1:Value>
         </ns1:Value>
         <ns1:Value>
          <ns1:Name>Name</ns1:Name>
          <ns1:Value>MultiObjects1</ns1:Value>
         </ns1:Value>
        </ns1:Values>
       </ns1:Item>
      </ns1:Items>
     </ns1:AttributeSet>
    </ns1:Data>
   </ns1:Objects>
   <ns2:Objects xmlns:ns2="http://exacttarget.com/wsdl/partnerAPI" xsi:type="ns2:ContactEvent">
    <ns2:PartnerKey xsi:nil="true" />
    <ns2:ModifiedDate xsi:nil="true" />
    <ns2:ObjectID xsi:nil="true" />
    <ns2:EventDefinitionKey>externalkeyforprods4</ns2:EventDefinitionKey>
    <ns2:Data>
     <ns2:AttributeSet>
      <ns2:PartnerKey xsi:nil="true" />
      <ns2:ModifiedDate xsi:nil="true" />
      <ns2:ObjectID xsi:nil="true" />
      <ns2:Name>2015-06 Event to Group DE</ns2:Name>
      <ns2:Items>
       <ns2:Item>
        <ns2:Values>
         <ns2:Value>
          <ns2:Name>ContactKey</ns2:Name>
          <ns2:Value>MultiObjects2</ns2:Value>
         </ns2:Value>
         <ns2:Value>
          <ns2:Name>Name</ns2:Name>
          <ns2:Value>MultiObjects2</ns2:Value>
         </ns2:Value>
        </ns2:Values>
       </ns2:Item>
      </ns2:Items>
     </ns2:AttributeSet>
    </ns2:Data>
   </ns2:Objects>
  </CreateRequest>
 </SOAP-ENV:Body>
</SOAP-ENV:Envelope>
```

## Related Items

[ContactEvent Object](https://developer.salesforce.com/docs/marketing/marketing-cloud/guide/contactevent.md)