Salesforce Developer Tutorial – How to Calculate the Distance Between Records Using Data Integration Rules and SOQL Distance Queries in Salesforce

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Have you ever needed to find all the Contacts within 10 miles of an office? Or maybe locate the nearest Leads to a traveling sales rep?

Typically, geo-location features like this require integrating with third-party tools or external maps APIs. However, Salesforce has a powerful native feature hidden in plain sight that can do this for you: Data Integration Rules.

In this post, we’re breaking down how to generate geo-coordinates and use SOQL to find the distance between records—all without leaving the platform.

Step 1: Activate Data Integration Rules

The first piece of the puzzle is getting the Latitude and Longitude for your records. You don’t need to manually look these up.

1. Navigate to Setup.
2. Search for and select Data Integration Rules.

Here, you will find a list of pre-built rules for standard objects like Account, Contact, and Lead. These rules can automatically sync geo-coordinates based on standard address fields (e.g., Billing Address or Shipping Address).

For example, you might see a rule labeled something like “Geocodes for Account Billing Address.”

3. Activate the rule relevant to your needs.

Once activated, Salesforce will process your records. After a few minutes, your records will automatically be populated with the correct Latitude and Longitude values corresponding to the address fields you selected.

Step 2: Querying with SOQL

Once your records have geo-data, the real magic happens in your code. You can use the DISTANCE function in a SOQL query to filter results based on proximity.

Here is the logic you would use in your Apex code:

1. Query the “Center” Record: First, get the specific account or record you want to measure from. You need its specific Latitude and Longitude.
2. Query the “Nearby” Records: Use the DISTANCE clause in a second query to find records within a specific radius.

The Code Example

Here is a simplified example of how the SOQL query looks. This snippet finds all accounts within 10 miles of a target account’s location.

Apex

// Assume targetLat and targetLong are the latitude and longitude coordinates from the record we are measuring //from
// We are using the 'ShippingAddress' field which now has geo-coordinates

List<Account> nearbyAccounts = [
    SELECT Id, Name, ShippingAddress 
    FROM Account 
    WHERE DISTANCE(ShippingAddress, GEOLOCATION(:targetLat, :targetLong), 'mi') < 10
];

• ShippingAddress: The compound field on the record being queried.
• GEOLOCATION(...): The coordinates of your starting point (the target account).
• 'mi': The unit of measurement (miles). You can also use 'km'.

Why This Matters

This native approach is incredibly powerful because:

• No API Costs: You aren’t paying for calls to Google Maps or other external geocoding services.
• Speed: It happens directly on the Salesforce platform.
• Flexibility: You can pipe these results into Lightning Web Components (LWC) to display maps, lists of nearby clients, or route planning tools.

By leveraging Data Integration Rules and standard SOQL, you unlock robust location-based features with zero external dependencies.

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Salesforce Development Books I Recommend

Advanced Apex Programming
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AI DISCLAIMER: Gemini assisted me in writing this blog post by analyzing and summarizing the contents on the YouTube video I created that is linked at the top of this post.