docs(audiences): document Salesforce custom object export limitation and workaround

[george-dilthey]

What changed

Added a new FAQ "Can I export signal data from Audiences to a Salesforce custom object?" to docs/audiences.md. The FAQ documents that Audiences' Salesforce export sync supports only standard Salesforce objects (People/Contacts/Leads and Companies/Accounts) — Salesforce custom objects are not currently supported as export targets — and provides a workaround using a standard Clay signals table with Salesforce enrichment actions.

Why

An Enterprise customer (Taboola) asked how to export signal data (specifically job postings associated with an audience segment) to Salesforce as records in a custom object. The Clay support team had to manually answer that this isn't supported from Audiences, providing the workaround of using standard signals tables with Salesforce enrichments. The docs had no FAQ or note covering this limitation — meaning Fin could not answer this question from the help content. The customer asked: "Not seeing a good way to export the job postings being associated here and providing to the sales team to see if they are valuable."

Source link(s)

• Intercom conversation: https://app.intercom.com/a/apps/w28k1kwz/inbox/inbox/all/conversations/215475021096306
• Internal Slack thread (July 7–9, 2026) where Clay engineering confirmed the limitation: https://clay-hq.slack.com/archives/C08B9DAQQP3/p1783434451704829
  • Ranveer Thind: "We only support exporting account and contacts to SFDC, so custom objects and associations will not be exported."
  • Jack Fan: "I don't think exporting to custom objects within audiences is something we're prioritizing in the near future"
  • Ariana Mesa (support): "as we cannot export to Audiences with custom objects in Salesforce, you can use the standard Salesforce Update Record enrichments in the standard signals tables"

Verifier verdicts

All four product-behavior claims verified PASS by Docsbot Verifier sub-agent:

1. Audiences export supports only standard Salesforce objects (Contacts/Leads and Accounts) — confirmed at:

   • clay-base/libs/shared/src/audiences/salesforce-object-types.ts:115-126: isExportSupportedForObjectType returns true only for Account and Contact
   • clay-base/services/audiences/src/materialization/services/export-handler.ts:3133-3134: case AudienceEntityType.Custom: throw new UnrecoverableError('Custom object export not yet implemented')

2. Lookup in Audiences and Update Audiences Record actions exist — confirmed at:

   • public-actions/apps/clay-labs/actions/lookup-in-audiences/action-definition.ts:19
   • public-actions/apps/clay-labs/actions/update-audiences-record/action-definition.ts:17

3. Workaround via standard Clay table + Salesforce enrichments — confirmed by both code (Salesforce enrichment actions accept custom object API names) and Ariana Mesa's explicit guidance to the Taboola customer.

Uncertainties

None. The limitation is confirmed in code (an unrecoverable error is thrown for custom object exports), and the workaround matches Clay's current official guidance.

Related observations

• PR docs(audiences): add field-filter warning to Snowflake and BigQuery import steps #1507 is also open on docs/audiences.md (adds Snowflake/BigQuery field mapping guidance) — no content conflict with this change.
• PR docs(audiences): add Databricks as beta import source #1485 is also open on docs/audiences.md (adds Databricks import documentation) — no content conflict with this change.
• The internal Slack thread (Juan Tejada, July 9 2026) mentioned that better activation of signal events directly — including export to custom Salesforce objects — is "on our radar." No committed timeline was shared, so this was not included in the doc. If/when this ships, the FAQ should be updated.

Closes DOC-1109

[linear-code]

DOC-1109