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Lifecycle Marketing

How Acima eliminated 80,000 duplicate records and rebuilt SFMC for scalable growth

Project Overview

Organisation

Acima

Industry

Financial Services (Lease-to-Own Retail Financing)

Mission

Empower consumers through accessible financing

Location

USA

Retail partners

Thousands across the U.S.

Products / Services Used

  • Dedicated Team
  • Salesforce Marketing Cloud
  • Email Marketing
  • Data Architecture
  • Deliverability Engineering

Acima is a leading lease-to-own solution provider. They help customers get products they need through flexible payment options. The business grew and expanded across thousands of U.S. retail partners which started straining its marketing operations.

‍

Salesforce Marketing Cloud was creating duplicate records faster than teams could clean them up. Every 15–30 days, someone had to manually delete records just to keep things moving. This wiped out valuable engagement history along the way and risked the removal of legitimate customers.

‍

At that point, another quick fix wasn’t going to cut it. The platform needed a structural rethink.

Performance Insights

Key results for the client

80K+

Duplicate records eliminated

0

Manual cleanup cycles needed

4

SFMC pillars re-architected

2

Embedded specialists

Client objectives

The challenges Acima faced

1.
Lack of structure in Subscriber Key architecture

The same email address could carry multiple Subscriber Keys. This flooded the "All Subscribers" list with duplicate records. Inflated record counts ate through Salesforce billing limits. Engagement history sat scattered across fragments of the same customer. Leadership couldn't trust a single marketing report.

2.
Manual cleanup as the only workaround

Every 15–30 days, the team was running manual subscriber removals just to keep the database in check. The cost: historical tracking data destroyed at each cycle, and a constant risk of deleting legitimate customers in the process.

3.
Campaigns built on a shaky foundation

Weekly, monthly, and ad-hoc campaigns ran on Journeys and Automation Studio workflows that lacked structured data relationships. Every setup turned into a time-consuming, error-prone effort. Bandwidth for strategy and optimisation had effectively disappeared.

4.
No data governance worth the name

Data Extension structures were inconsistent. There were no preventive controls stopping duplicates from being created in the first place. Segmentation accuracy suffered. Bounce rates climbed. The platform was running on hygiene that didn't scale.

5.
Deliverability eroding under subscriber fatigue

Overlapping targeting was hitting the same subscribers repeatedly. Without the engagement-based suppression or optimized send timing. Domain and IP configuration gaps were hurting inbox placement.

Mavlers Strategy

How we delivered SFMC stability at scale

1.
Subscriber Key unification and data architecture rebuild

A comprehensive audit ran across All Subscribers, Data Extensions, Journeys, and Automations. Email Address was standardized as the single unified Subscriber Key. Records with multiple keys were resolved. Recurring journeys and their Data Extensions were redesigned so consistent Subscriber Key relationships held from the ground up.

2.
Cleanup with governance

Structured backup Data Extensions captured engagement, bounce, and unsubscribe data before any cleanup ran. It preserved the historical record that manual deletions had been destroying. Non-aligned Subscriber Keys were removed. Validation rules and governance controls went in to prevent the problem from returning.

3.
Automation Studio overhaul

Workflows for recurring, weekly, monthly, and ad-hoc campaigns were reviewed and rebuilt for efficiency. Journey entry sources were restructured to control record injection logic. Data Extension relationships and naming conventions were aligned to support scalable, structured execution.

4.
Deliverability engineering

Einstein Send Time Optimization was deployed. IP warming, domain alignment, and authentication standardization closed the configuration gaps hurting inbox placement. Engagement-based segmentation and suppression logic replaced overlapping targeting.

5.
Embedded operating model

A half-time dedicated team - 1 SFMC SME and 1 Campaign Manager & Developer - became part of Acima's marketing operations. Continuous oversight, strategic and technical work happened in parallel, not in conflict.

Results

What Acima achieved

80,000+ duplicate records eliminated

With historical engagement data preserved through structured backup before cleanup.

Manual cleanup cycle removed entirely

Previously running every 15–30 days, now zero.

Subscriber Key structure unified

Restoring historical engagement tracking and reporting accuracy.

Salesforce subscriber utilization back under control

Billing limits no longer absorb the cost of duplicates. 

Bounce rates declined

Duplicate sends fixed, open and click-through rates lifted with Send Time Optimization.

Campaign execution faster

With manual dependency reduced across recurring and ad-hoc work.

A stable SFMC foundation

Supporting growth instead of working against it. 

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Whether it's landing pages, email templates, or journeys in Marketing Cloud, Mavlers is a valuable part of our team - making changes on the fly, always there for support.

Sandra Field
Matthew Allred

Marketing manager

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