Category: Updates

Salesforce has scheduled to enable the Lightning interface for all Salesforce users that have not yet migrated in January 2020. Salesforce users will still be able to access the classic interface, but there are many reasons why users should make the switch to Lightning. Customers on Salesforce’s new UI interface have increased their productivity by nearly 25%.

Corrao Group recommends all classic users to plan for the switch in 2020. You can start by turning Lightning on per user per department. Try Lightning out with the Sales or Service teams to get them trained, and when they feel comfortable, start with the next department. Your employees will become much more productive and find better results once they make the move to Lightning.

What is Lightning?

The Lightning Experience is a new interface that helps users build apps faster, create custom business logic, customize your user interface, and more. With a complete redesign, Lightning is a modern-day interface that allows users to build Lightning pages without code, using custom-built Lightning Components. Corrao Group doesn’t see Lightning as just a new interface. The Lightning Experience allows you to improve your processes and do so much more with better user adoption. Today is the best time for your company to re-evaluate and re-optimize your Salesforce system based upon your unique business needs. Lightning is also integrated with Einstein, Salesforce’s automated intelligence platform. Einstein provides helpful insights to help make jobs easier and boost production.

How Is Lightning Better Than Classic?

Better User Interface

First of all, the Lightning experience looks and feels better than Classic. Your company can personalize Salesforce to fit your company’s brand logo and colors. Customized pages allow you to drag and drop different components on to your page so that every page can look different based upon the record type or app you find most relevant for your business.

In addition to the look of the instance, Lightning is easier to use than Classic. Everything on the Lightning platform from creating records to editing records is faster. For example, when you are on a record for a lead and you want to give them a call, Lightning allows you to call prospects directly from the lead page with a click of a button. If they don’t pick up the phone, use one of your pre-recorded voice mails, drop the message, and keep on working. A new feature, Salesforce’s Quick Actions, allow users to update records faster with the ability to log a call, send an email, or create a task from any page within Lightning.

New Features

All new features released by Salesforce going forward will be specific for Lightning. Classic users are missing out on tons of improvements to the Salesforce system that helps improve your employee’s productivity. Lightning is integrated with Einstein to look at your data to predict outcomes on your sales deals. Einstein now offers insights into whether deals are likely to get bigger, smaller, or get pushed out to the next month. In addition to Einstein, the list below contains new features released by Salesforce that Classic users are missing out on. You can see the full difference between the two orgs right here.

• • Pardot Einstein Campaign Insights
  • Einstein Activity Metrics and Pricing Guidance
  • Marketing Cloud Integration with Google Analytics 360
  • Advertising Studio
  • Mobile: Customized Mobile Experiences and the New Salesforce Mobile App
  • Salesforce Essentials
  • Salesforce Einstein: Quarterly Forecasting, Case Routing, and Code-Free Predictions on Records
  • Field Service: Time Sheets, Health Check, and Extended Match Work Rules
  • Knowledge: Expanded Channels, Flexible Styles, and Improved Article Management
  • Recycle Bin now in Lightning
  • Lightning Flows
  • Customized Reports and Dashboards
  • Kanban View
  • Quick Actions

Enhancements On Existing Features

Salesforce took the pain points that users had in classic and made improvements to make them better in Lightning. For example, there are added enhancements on existing features such as reports and dashboards. Lightning dashboards look much better in Lightning now that you are not limited to the 3 Column layout. Users can now customize dashboards to a specific size or style that best fits your interests. In addition to the look and feel of dashboards, Salesforce has added a Kanban view which has been a big hit for Salesforce users. The Kanban view allows users to take any list you want, and with a click of a button, users can see each record as a card with the ability to drag and drop the cards into different stages depending on where your deal is.

Corrao Group Can Help You Make The Switch

As a partner of Salesforce for over 11 years, Corrao Group can help your company make the transition from Classic to Lightning. We have grown up using Classic and have made the switch to Lightning over a year ago to find a new UI system that allows our business to run quicker, better, and faster. Lightning should not be considered as “something we will get to eventually.” Migrating to Lightning is something you will need to budget for, and eventually implement by the end of the year. Look at switching to Lightning as a move that will help your entire company in terms of use and ease. As a partner of Salesforce for 11 years, our recommendation would be to contact a professional who has been through this before and can help you through every step of your process.

Please visit our contact us page to get a quote or assessment before it is too late!

The release of Salesforce’s new Manufacturing Cloud will help manufacturers gain access and visibility into their full business operations. Having one single source of truth is critical for collaboration on sale agreements, forecasting, and more. Salesforce solved major points for the manufacturing community by creating a new cloud for the next generation of manufacturers. Below is a list of our favorite Manufacturing Cloud features.

Sales Agreements

Manufacturers can unify their run-rate business with information housed on the Enterprise Resource Platform (ERP) and order management system. Both the account and operations teams will now have access to a single source of truth, continually updating in real-time as changes to the deals are made. Sales Agreements give users full visibility into committed and actual order volumes, the performance of the agreement against the forecast, and other time-phased metrics.

Account-Based Forecasting

Manufacturers can now gain insights into their current business as well as future opportunities. Leverage account-based forecasting to develop more accurate forecasts for your sales, finance, and operation teams. “Account teams can also add updates on changing customer needs or market demands, allowing the team to collaborate and adjust forecasts in real-time (Salesforce).”

Einstein Analytics

Automatically gain insight into your account health, demand insights, product penetration, and sales agreement process. According to Ashish Kofhani, the Senior Vice President of Products, Einstein Analytics is his favorite new feature. He says, “Of all the new features, my personal favorite is the Manufacturing Einstein Analytics Pack. Einstein analyzes all the data from net new business, run rate business, past orders, current orders, etc. and churns out insights and recommendations on which accounts to target, products to position, and prices to quote. It is AI in action.”

Community Cloud

Extend pre-built sales agreement templates to your channel partners to collaborate on deals, leads, and opportunities. Leverage Community Cloud for company-wide visibility into all business processes to ensure all your partners are on the same page. Through integrating the Community Cloud platform, you can extend real-time transparency and collaboration capabilities in Manufacturing Cloud to your clients and partners.

Mulesoft AnyPoint Platform

The Mulesoft Anypoint Platform’s ERP plugins and templates make it easy to collect order information from your ERP or order management systems. By unifying your back office with your front office, you can reduce the complexity of integration. Mulesoft’s platform helps manufacturers maintain a real-time, accurate view of their account activity.

Forecasting

Manufacturing Cloud allows users to take control of their forecasts to have a more accurate description of their entire business. We talked more about how forecasting will impact manufacturers in our last blog, which you can find here.

Decades of Manufacturing Experience

Working with Salesforce since 2008, we’ve have seen the invaluable benefits that a CRM can have for companies, especially those in the manufacturing industry. Salesforce’s new Manufacturing Cloud will allow customers and their partners to have company-wide visibility into all business processes. With tools such as sales agreements and forecasting, data can be analyzed effortlessly. Salesforce consulting services have been just as important to us as business process optimization, and we strive to help businesses maximize their investments into their CRM and Manufacturing Cloud.

Sources

https://www.salesforce.com/company/news-press/stories/2019/09/091619-kc/

https://www.salesforce.com/products/manufacturing-cloud/overview/

 

 

We’ve attended the webinars, read through the release notes, and used the features. With our customers in mind, we trained our team on these new features to improve our Salesforce consulting services. In addition to the full Salesforce Winter ’20 release notes found at the bottom of the blog, here are some of our favorites.

Sales Cloud 

Einstein: Forecasting Enhancements

• Description: Einstein forecasting allows users to conduct quarterly forecasting along with monthly forecasting.
• Benefits: Receive better insights from AI to make better business decisions concerning the stages of your deals.

Sales Cadence Branching

• Description: Branching, which looks and feels identical to the branching in Pardot’s Engagement Studio, allows you to create two different next best steps for your sales representatives.
• Benefits: Sales Cadence Branching saves your sales reps time and moves their lead or contact to the next best step, whether that’s through an email or call.

Service Cloud 

Einstein Case Routing

• Description: Einstein Case Routing automatically classifies and routes support cases based on a range of criteria including qualifications, areas of expertise, and historical success rates.
• Benefits: Service Agents don’t have to manually review cases and have more time to help customers.

Lightning Knowledge Enhancements

• Description: Users now have the ability to send knowledge articles on any platform in real-time.
• Benefits: Share a Knowledge Article with customers in conversations or with social posts when they are having issues.

Pardot 

Snippets

• Description: Creating snippets in Pardot allow companies who host webinars or other recurring events to reuse content without having to update the email and email templates themselves.
• Benefits: Save your users more time and increase productivity with the ability to reuse content.

Marketing Cloud 

Einstein Send Time Optimization

• Description: Use Journey Builder activity to find the best time for each individual email subscriber based on their history of engagement.
• Benefits: Helps improve your open rates by making sure your emails are sent at the most relevant time for your customers, leads, or contacts.

Platform, Productivity, and Integration 

Real-Time Event Monitoring

• Description: Use real-time event monitoring to detect and prevent risky events in Salesforce.
• Benefits: Get greater insights into security concerns, performance metrics, and system usage.

New Salesforce Mobile App

• Description: Rebuilt to bring a brand new experience. Completely personalized navigation allows users to customize their app to their own personal needs.
• Benefits: Lightning helps unify the Salesforce desktop and mobile experience with power navigation and AI-powered out-of-the-box functionality that improves productivity.

Salesforce Data Integration Enhancements

• Description: Users will be able to easily embed Salesforce reports and list views in Quip. Log calls in Quip and sync them back to Salesforce without having to leave Quip.
• Benefits: Increase user’s productivity by getting all your work done in Quip.

Einstein Analytics 

Einstein Discovery: Automated Story Creation

• Description: Create a story by selecting a data set in which Einstein Discovery intelligently determines which metrics to optimize and which fields to analyze to give you insights about your data.
• Benefits: Einstein Discovery does all the work for you, which frees up more of your time to work on other tasks while getting the best trends and insights into the data you want to see.

Einstein Analytics in the New Salesforce Mobile App

• Description: Access all your important data through search, favorites, chatter, and embedded dashboards.
• Benefit: Have to work on the go? No problem. Salesforce’s new mobile app mixed with Einstein Analytics allows users to stay on the go while being able to harness the same power of Salesforce on a desktop.

The Salesforce Winter 20’ Release Notes does bring exciting new features for Salesforce employees and customers. However, customers still using classic will not be able to use these features.

Lightning does need to be activated to maximize the Winter Release Notes. Lightning will be enabled for all users coming this January. It’s important that you start thinking about making the transition if you haven’t yet. We have the tools and knowledge to help you with your transition.

Sources

https://releasenotes.docs.salesforce.com/en-us/winter20/release-notes/salesforce_release_notes.htm

https://trailhead.salesforce.com/en/content/learn/modules/winter-20-release-highlights

All Images and logos from Salesforce 

Going through every little detail of the Salesforce Summer 19’ Release Notes can be very time-consuming. We’ve decided to highlight the most popular features that have been circulating with a description and a benefit for each new release.

It’s important to note that most of these newly released features are only available in Salesforce Lightning and not Classic.

Sales Cloud

Pardot Einstein Campaign Insights

• Description: Einstein currently gives you essential statistics and insights on how your campaigns are executing. You can discover more insights from Einstein for other marketing assets like prospect details, list emails, engagement, and marketing forms. Linking Pardot with Salesforce will enable you to keep every one of your records in a single spot.
• Benefits: Helps marketers analyze buyer behavior, dissect data, and find similarities of what your prospects share to maximize your campaign effectiveness.

Einstein Activity Metrics

• Description: When you click on an Opportunity, you can now view the last email date and the Einstein score of the Opportunity. In the reports tab, you can see who has been active and who needs your recognition.
• Benefits: Activity metrics in Sales Cloud makes it easy to get a complete view of all activity so that your sales team can know how to prioritize their time with their customers and prospects.

Einstein Pricing Guidance

• Description: When Sales reps add a product with pricing guidance to their quote, they can view the suggested target, norm, and floor discount amounts. If the representative chooses the target price, Salesforce CPQ applies the fitting discount to the quote line.
• Benefits: Helps your sales team close deals by providing them with pricing guidance based on historical deals and product pricing trends.

Salesforce Milestone Confetti Celebration

• Description: Sales will drop virtual confetti across the screen when reps reach a certain milestone.
• Benefits: A fun feature released by Salesforce to help your team celebrate success.

Visit our Sales Cloud services page to learn how we can optimize your sales processes.

Service Cloud

Field Service Lightning: Dispatch Console Enhancements 

• Description: Schedule a service appointment by dragging it from the map onto a service resource’s schedule in the Gantt.
• Benefits: Faster schedule and dispatch jobs right on the map and view long-cycle jobs by month directly on the Gantt.

Marco Enhancements

• Description: Be more productive with smart macros in Lightning Experience that include conditional instructions.
• Benefits: Increase employee productivity by automating routine tasks based on a set of conditions and criteria. Adding expressions into the builder will help specify steps, timing, and streamline macros.

Digital Engagement: Agent-Initiated Messaging

• Description: When an issue needs additional examination, agents can leave the messaging conversation to find the solution. Then, return to restart the conversation. Agents can now connect with customers via SMS.
• Benefits: Resolve customer problems faster than ever. Replies become automatically routed back to the same agent every time.

Visit our Service Cloud services page to see how we can hep improve your service department.

Marketing Cloud 

Marketing Cloud Integration with Google Analytics 360 Enhancements

• Description: Create IDs between Google Analytics 360 and Marketing Cloud for a single user. By linking these two IDs, you can build audiences based on Google Analytics data for web and mobile app activity, email engagement, and offline behavior.
• Benefits: Capture the customer’s behavior and actions like goal non-completes, page exits, browse abandons, and search abandons.

Advertising Studio Integration with Google Customer Match

• Description: Users can now match their data to Google with more than just email. Now you match mobile ID, phone number, address, and user ID.
• Benefits: Increasing match rates, and make your marketing work for you. With more attributes added, customers have an increased chance at achieving higher match rates, and ultimately, a greater return on ad spend.

Einstein Engagement Frequency

• Description: Maximize customer engagement by pinpointing the right number of emails to send over a time frame. If you send too many emails, you can risk wearing down the customer. Send too few, and you might miss out on a sales opportunity.
• Benefits: Einstein Engagement Frequency addresses these concerns by discovering the best email frequency range to meet your goals with your customers or subscribers.

Visit our Salesforce Marketing cloud services page to learn how we can help customize your marketing content for your clients.

Salesforce Summer 19’ Release Notes in Conclusion

The Salesforce Summer 19’ Release Notes does bring exciting new features for Salesforce employees and customers. However, for the customers that are still using classic could be in trouble.

Lightning does need to be activated to maximize the Salesforce Summer 19’ Release Notes. Lightning will be enabled for all users coming this October. In addition, we do offer services to help you with your transition.

Sources

Salesforce.com

Salesforce release notes

Salesforce release notes images

It’s well known that 87% of B2B marketers agree that ABM delivers a higher ROI than any other method (ITSMA). The next question everyone asks is, “where should I start?” ABM for beginners is a complex strategy, and newcomers can quickly become intimidated by the time and effort it takes to run. The truth is, even a company with 10 employees can successfully execute an ABM strategy. All it takes is knowing how to start correctly with a solid foundation. Businesses just don’t start ABM with 200 accounts on day one; they start out with a few accounts, show ROI and success, correct themselves, and continue to scale. ABM for beginners starts with building the right team.

1. Form the Team

An ABM strategy is only as great as the team that develops it. It’s pivotal that ABM teams are built correctly with the right people. They will be responsible for defining the goals and KPIs, developing the strategy, and executing to produce results. There is no magic number for the right team as it varies based on the company’s size. Recommended team members include the heads of Sales and Marketing, including those involved with content strategy, technology management, and media managers. Once the team is assembled, it’s time to decide on who your customers will be with your ABM strategy.

2. Identify Target Accounts

With hundreds and even thousands of accounts on file, is there a trick to pinpointing the ones that would provide the highest chance of ROI? There is, creating your Ideal Customer Profile (ICP). An ICP is a description of a company that is the perfect fit for your solution. Criteria can include industry, budget, employee headcount, the technology they use, etc. Based on how many criteria a company meets, they should be segmented or tiered. Those that meet more criteria of the ICP should produce the most ROI, so they should be tiered higher and given more attention and resources. For example, if your solution is perfect for a company in the manufacturing industry with a budget of $30k, has 400 employees whom all use Gmail, that would be a Tier 1 client. If an account comes in that meets only one out of eight potential criteria, they would be a tier 3 client. Once some tier 1 accounts are segmented, we can then target and message the decision-making contacts at the account.

3. Highlight Decision-Makers

Finding out those who will ultimately say yes or no to your solution at a company will help your team market to them, swaying them to say yes. These decision-makers usually are c-level, but it’s also important to find out those who may not be in the c-suite but still have a major influence on this decision. Finding out who these contacts are can be done through interactions with the company as well as conducting research. The value here is having the confidence that you know who you’re speaking to will ultimately be the ones making the decision on your solution. A buyer persona should be filled out for each decision-maker, and include info on their daily activities and pain points. Knowing about your buyers’ pain points will help marketing create their content, and help sales with their outreach since they’ll know what pains to address. Having these contacts highlighted will help you in the next step when you create custom content for each decision-maker.

4. Design Outreach Plan

In traditional marketing, the same content is usually blasted out to everyone in all types of roles. ABM is about sending custom content about how your solution(s) will help the recipient in their specific role. This requires research to be done on what challenges they face daily, and how your offering will solve it. For example, a VP of Marketing at a tier 1 account will receive content from your company on how your solution will help produce more quality leads because it is a pain point for them. This can be time-consuming, but well worth the investment. Once the content is finalized, incorporating it into the larger outreach plan will help paint the larger picture for everyone. You’ll designate who will receive content and when, when a call from sales will go out, when they will see an ad about your solution, etc.

5. Expand Accounts, ROI Reporting

ABM requires an abundance of research, but the time and resources is well worth the investment. Due to all the research your company will do, they can find additional ways that your solution(s) can help a customer that would have never been found through traditional marketing. This stops the one-and-done projects and allows a longer engagement and more success for both your company and the customer. After ABM has been running for some time, it’s time to report on your success, did ABM work for your company? ABM reporting can be one of the more difficult efforts to track unless you have the right technology. It’s not recommended to track efforts manually as it would be too time-consuming, and not scalable. Our recommended tool is Salesforce’s Einstein B2B Marketing Analytics as it helps see top-level KPIs, identifies top-engaging accounts, see current stages, and much more.

ABM for Beginners: Final Thoughts

Account-Based Marketing will take time to show revenue due to the deals typically being larger in size. With ABM’s marketing efforts generating 200% more revenue than others, it’s well worth it (Flip My Funnel). In addition to having a great strategy, the technology used is also an important factor. Tried and true for both ourselves and our customers, the Salesforce platform has all the tools and connections to accomplish your ABM campaigns. Corrao Group offers services that both help set up your system for ABM training and campaigns, as well as execute and run it for your organization. If you’d like to download our full Account-Based Marketing Guide for B2B Marketers, please fill out the form below.