Create Salesforce Pardot Dashboards in Bold BI

Bold BI allows you to create, share, and collaborate on interactive BI dashboards. When paired with CData Connect Server, you get instant access to Salesforce Pardot data for visualizations, dashboards, and more. This article shows how to create a virtual database for Salesforce Pardot and build reports from Salesforce Pardot data in Bold BI.

CData Connect Server provides a pure SQL Server interface for Salesforce Pardot, allowing you to easily build reports from live Salesforce Pardot data in Bold BI — without replicating the data to a natively supported database. As you build visualizations, Bold BI generates SQL queries to gather data. Using optimized data processing out of the box, CData Connect Server pushes all supported SQL operations (filters, JOINs, etc) directly to Salesforce Pardot, leveraging server-side processing to quickly return the requested Salesforce Pardot data.

Create a Virtual SQL Server Database for Salesforce Pardot Data

CData Connect Server uses a straightforward, point-and-click interface to connect to data sources and generate APIs.

1. Login to Connect Server and click Connections.
2. Select "Salesforce Pardot" from Available Data Sources.
3. Enter the necessary authentication properties to connect to Salesforce Pardot.

   Salesforce Pardot supports connecting through API Version, Username, Password and User Key.

   • ApiVersion: The Salesforce Pardot API version which the provided account can access. Defaults to 4.
   • User: The Username of the Salesforce Pardot account.
   • Password: The Password of the Salesforce Pardot account.
   • UserKey: The unique User Key for the Salesforce Pardot account. This key does not expire.
   • IsDemoAccount (optional): Set to TRUE to connect to a demo account.

   Accessing the Pardot User Key

   The User Key of the current account may be accessed by going to Settings -> My Profile, under the API User Key row.

4. Click Save Changes
5. Click Privileges -> Add and add the new user (or an existing user) with the appropriate permissions.

With the virtual database created, you are ready to connect to Salesforce Pardot data from Bold BI.

Visualize Live Salesforce Pardot Data in Bold BI

The steps below outline connecting to CData Connect Server from Bold BI to create a new Salesforce Pardot data source and build a simple visualization from the data.

1. Log into your Bold BI instance, click the data sources tab, create a new data source, and choose the SQL Server connector.
2. Choose the basic configuration and set the connection properties:
   • Name: Name your connection
   • Server name: Your Connect Server instance (CONNECT_SERVER_URL)
   • Port: 1433
   • Username: Your Connect Server username
   • Password: Your Connect Server password
   • Mode: Choose Live to query Salesforce Pardot on-demand or choose Extract to load the data into Bold BI
   • Database: Choose the database you created from the drop-down menu (pardotdb)
3. Click Connect
4. Select the table to visualize and drag it onto the workspace.
5. Select a visualization style and add it to the report.
6. Click the gear icon for the visualization to configure the visualization properties and assign columns to the visualization.

SQL Access to Salesforce Pardot Data from Applications

Now you have a direct connection to live Salesforce Pardot data from your Bold BI workbook. You can create more data sources and new visualizations, build reports, and more — all without replicating Salesforce Pardot data.

To get SQL data access to 200+ SaaS, Big Data, and NoSQL sources directly from your applications, see the CData Connect page.