Have you ever attempted to tackle a Salesforce® implementation in-house, lacking the necessary knowledge and expertise, only to find yourself falling short of achieving your goals? Perhaps you’ve experienced the frustration of navigating through the complexities of Salesforce features and functionalities, resulting in wasted time, effort, and resources. Your initial excitement may have waned as you questioned the suitability of Salesforce for your needs.

This is where the importance of engaging a Certified Salesforce Consultant becomes evident. Without the guidance of an experienced partner, you risk prolonging the implementation process and squandering additional resources.

Recognizing the 9 Signs: When to Bring in a Salesforce Consultant

If you’re keen to steer clear of the pitfalls of a DIY implementation, consider these nine indicators as compelling reasons to seek the assistance of a Certified Salesforce Consultant.

1. Stagnant or Declining Sales: A consultant can help identify areas for improvement and unlock the full potential of Salesforce to boost sales.
2. Customer Satisfaction Issues: A well-optimized Salesforce system significantly enhances customer experience.
3. Lack of 360-Degree Customer View: Fragmented customer data across different systems hinders sales, service, and marketing efforts. A consultant can unify customer data for a holistic view.
4. Poor User Adoption: Low user adoption of Salesforce indicates a need to improve user engagement and address challenges faced by end-users.
5. Difficulty Proving ROI: A consultant can help measure progress and demonstrate the impact of Salesforce on achieving your business goals.
6. Underutilizing Salesforce Capabilities: Consultants can identify and leverage valuable features and apps within the Salesforce ecosystem to maximize your investment.
7. Stalled Salesforce Projects: Overburdened internal teams might struggle to complete Salesforce projects on time. A consultant with expertise in various areas expedites project completion.
8. Salesforce Innovations: Salesforce is constantly evolving with new features, functionalities, and integrations. A consultant keeps you updated on the latest advancements and advises on how to leverage them for your specific needs.
9. Focus on Artificial Intelligence (AI): AI is playing an increasingly important role in Salesforce. A consultant can help you explore all of Salesforce’s AI-powered tools for deeper insights and data-driven decision-making.

How AdVic Can Help

If you’ve concluded that you need help with your Salesforce system, we invite you to contact an Ad Victoriam Certified Salesforce Consultant today to see how we can help address your challenges to increase the value of your system. If you are not ready to chat, check out the resources below for additional guidance. 

Related Resources:

The Power of Managed Services in Technology Management
You Build It and They Come Doesn’t Work with CRM Adoption

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2021 comes with the added pressure of kicking off a new year still mired in the middle of a global pandemic and all that comes with it personally and professionally. But to ease your stress, AdVic polled our awesome team of consultants and compiled a list of seven Salesforce New Year Resolutions – and tips – to consider that will help you and your team crush your collective goals in 2021! Bookmark it, print it out, keep it handy… and all the best to you and yours in 2021!

Top 7 2021 Salesforce Resolutions

1. Transition to Lightning

• Lightning has matured and has most if not all features you will need.
• New functionality will allow for increased productivity.

2. Automate Manual Processes 

• It’s 2021, automate everything.
• Free people up to do more complex tasks.

3. Integration with Systems Outside of Salesforce

• Stop flipping to multiple systems for information.
• Tons of middlemen and connects out there.

4. Learn About a New Cloud That Can Streamline Your Business

• Sales or Service Cloud probably doesn’t run your entire business, explore other clouds.
• Explore other clouds such as Commerce Cloud to add a new sales channel.

5. Stop Developing in Production

• Use proper development life cycle IE developing in sandbox and deploying to production.
• Reduce data loss and production scares.
• Have confidence in making changes and deployments.

6. Start Writing Documentation for all Orgs Automation and Integration

• You didn’t do it the first time, but now is your chance to help your future self and others that come into the org with documentation.
• This will help you understand what is going on your org.

7. Clean Up/Remove Objects and Automation Not Being Used

• Review all of the automation in your org to understand if it’s still useful.
• Use AppExchange tools to see how often the automation has run.

2021 is here… Embrace it! And if Ad Victoriam can help you with any of your cloud or data challenges out-of-the-gate in this new year, we’re at the ready! Quickly reach us here.

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Let Them Know You Are There for Them

These are scary times filled with uncertainty. Talk to each employee as a human being first. Each individual will have their own unique fears and challenges. Let them articulate these to you and let them know you hear them. If their children are out of school, let them know it’s OK to make time (and maybe some extra time) for having breakfast and lunch with their families or to take a walk to get out of the house. If they are scared or frustrated, let them get their feelings out.

Check-In Regularly

Think of all the touchpoints you have with your team during a traditional day in the office. At their desk, in the break room, filling up at the water cooler, a quick conversation in the hallway. Effective managers of remote teams replicate these touchpoints. Utilize GChat, Slack, or text messages to check in throughout the day. For your more extroverted employees, pick up the phone and let them talk.

Business as Kind-of-Usual

These times are unprecedented. But remote work isn’t much different than office work. Make things seem as usual as you can. Go forward with planned training, reviews, one-on-ones, and check-ins. In times of great uncertainty, your employees will be looking to you to provide some sense of normalcy and routine.

When the Smoke Clears …

If your staff didn’t work from home before, they are going to want to work from home at least some of the time after enjoying the benefits of remote work. It offers more flexibility for family time, errands, and working out. And when managed right, you’ll realize (as will your employees) that everything is in place to allow them to spend more time outside of the office. Be ready for this conversation and, if it works for your business, offer a more flexible office/remote work schedule.

One of the benefits of today’s technology is that it can help keep your teams connected even when they aren’t in the same physical location. This is especially important when it comes to collaborating and communicating across teams. Tools like the numerous cloud integration solutions Salesforce offers – and Ad Victoriam consultants can help you integrate – don’t replace face-to-face communication but they can develop a structure for staying engaged even as your workforce works remotely from home.

So, during these uncertain times, Ad Victoriam encourages you to not stop moving your business forward, because we aren’t, and we’re here to help you every step of the way.

The AdVic team hopes you and your loved ones remain safe and healthy.

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What to Wear/Bring

1. With over 2,700 Dreamforce sessions and workshops, exhibits, and just general running around, you’ll absolutely want to wear comfortable shoes as you take in as much as your time allows. But be sure to pack your dancing shoes, too, for all the fun nighttime festivities.
2. As for what to wear, remember that it may be warm outside, it’s cooler inside in the air conditioning, so bring an extra layer for inside, just in case. Oh, and it has been known to rain in the City by the Bay, so a small umbrella for your backpack could come in handy.
3. Best to pack light. You’re most likely going to need room to carry around all the cool swag you’ll acquire.
4. Speaking of packing light, if you need to bring a laptop, bring a small one, as you’ll do a lot of walking, plus having one with you gives you access to Salesforce and your favorite developer tools to try out some cool things you just learned. And, hey, you may even knock-out a few Trailhead modules, too!
5. Don’t forget you’ll need to power up – a lot! That means remember to pack all the power cords you need for recharging your arsenal of gadgets, including any portable power devices you have, too.

How to Plan Your Days

1. Sign up for your session early, but before you do, ask yourself what your top three goals to learn are and plan your agenda with those goals in mind. And most of all, do not overbook yourself (see No. 2).
2. Pace yourself! Do not try to do it all, you’ll wear yourself out, and quickly! Pick 1-2 sessions a day (ones you REALLY will benefit from), and spend your time in between time networking
3. Don’t forget to leave gaps in your Dreamforce schedule. Doing that will give you enough time to get to your next session. You may need to refuel with a quick snack on your way to that next session or meeting.

How to Network

1. Have fun. Don’t be afraid to approach people with a question or comment.
2. Remember that people attending the same Dreamforce sessions you are most likely to have the same interests you do, so start a conversation. Make a new Trailblazer friend or two and ask him or her before the session what they hope to get out of it.
3. Ask others what sessions they have already attended and what they have gotten out of them.
4. Remember this mantra: Learn. Share, Network.
5. A great place to practice all of the above networking tips you just learned will be the Dreamforce Expo.

The Road to Dreamforce

Lastly, an absolute must-do is making it a point to watch “The Road to Dreamforce.” This is your go-to live broadcast for everything Dreamforce-related. It airs Tuesdays at 11:00 a.m. PT. Each of the 11 episodes will provide a deep dive into topics including Dreamforce programs, top sessions to attend, newbie tips, and more.

However, probably the best piece of advice we can offer is to remember that Dreamforce is an amazing experience and with a little preparation, you can make it even more rewarding.

The Ad Victoriam team will be at Dreamforce, too, so if you would like to meet up, email us at CustomerService@AdVictoriamSolutions.com or schedule your meeting today.

Hope to see you there!

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