With its robust features, Salesforce is an indispensable tool for empowering sales pipeline and customer relationship management and is trusted by more than 150,000 companies worldwide.
The key to making it a successful platform is leveraging its potential with the right approach and converting it to one that can take advantage of its full potential; This is where many companies need help, which hinders them from reaping the full benefit of Salesforce.
Some common challenges are faced when working with Salesforce, especially when upgrading or expanding to include new services. Keep reading to learn more about some of the most common challenges in implementing Salesforce.
The challenges in implementing Salesforce can be divided into two broad categories, technical and non-technical.
Duplicate records:
One of the common issues during Salesforce integration is duplicate records, which can lead to various data-related problems. To avoid these issues, it’s crucial to have a system that can identify and remove duplicate data entries.
When data is imported, unique external IDs can be used to prevent duplicate records from being imported. An external ID is a custom data field containing unique record identifiers from systems outside of Salesforce CRM. When this method is used, the import wizard runs the existing records in Salesforce CRM against the external IDs and identifies matching values in the import file; This ensures that only new, unique records are imported into Salesforce CRM.
Lack of In-house Salesforce expertise:
User adoption is a crucial issue when implementing Salesforce. Too often, companies need to hire an expert to help with the implementation process and teach employees how to use the new CRM. As a result, employees find the CRM overwhelming and unproductive and may even make mistakes. To ensure the successful adoption of Salesforce, it's essential to provide training to employees in advance and throughout. By doing so, the employees are prepared for success and ensure that everyone on the team knows how to use the platform.
Difficult to customize:
Salesforce is a versatile CRM platform serving companies of all sizes and types. The platform has to be customized to suit specific business needs and goals to get the most out of it. Several tools are available to help do this, but finding and learning about all the possibilities can take time. Such customization may also need assistance from a Salesforce implementation partner who profoundly understands the platform and can offer dedicated support to help personalize it according to the requirements.
User onboarding and training:
User onboarding is a crucial part of any Salesforce implementation. A software implementation that fails to work due to user inability will fail.
Luckily, Salesforce is so popular and has such an active user community that plenty of training and education resources are available online. It is important, however, to educate the users properly to use Salesforce to accomplish their business goals. Salesforce training at the primary level will not solve this issue. Since Salesforce can be configured in many ways, user onboarding and training are needed to fit your specific needs.
Complicating things by opting for more features than required:
While Salesforce CRM has a lot to offer to improve business processes, it is optional to incorporate every feature into the business. Complicating things by using more features than necessary can cost more in Salesforce Implementation. Sometimes, less is more.
Misinterpreting real-time integration:
Integrating Salesforce with the company's other software and applications is important to ensure a cohesive workflow; This could be challenging, but it's worth it to enable data exchange and get extra functionality like efficiency and visibility. Ensure a proper integration strategy is in place with the Salesforce Implementation partner before finalizing the Salesforce setup; This will help to decide which existing software to use going forward.
Data Mapping:
Some common Salesforce integration challenges arise during data mapping. For example, field types might vary on different applications, leading to code and data mapping problems. During Salesforce CRM implementation, it's important to map data to avoid these kinds of issues carefully.
When data fields are mapped, it's important to use the correct field type; This ensures that the data is compatible with the targeted application. Another good practice is to convert the data to the supported field type of the targeted application; This helps avoid mismatched data.
Choosing the right Salesforce Partner:
Salesforce offers many great out-of-the-box solutions, but individually customizable ones might be more efficient. It is important to hire a knowledgeable and experienced Salesforce partner who can explain all the pros and cons of the Salesforce CRM for the business.
Estimation of Cost:
Before deciding which software to implement, the cost is always a significant concern for business owners. Organizations want to know if the investment will pay off quickly and if the CRM tool is worth the price. Learning more about Salesforce is essential to get answers to these and other questions. By getting a consultancy, crucial knowledge can be gained regarding licensing, customization, and implementation. A certified consulting partner will help better understand which is the right fit for the business needs. More informed decisions can be made with proper guidance, leading to good investment returns.
With the proper guidance, the money invested is deserving, thus ensuring good returns.
Lack of support from Salesforce:
Even though Salesforce offers a free support plan, response times can be delayed. In addition, Salesforce may only provide guidance on possible solutions rather than resolving the issues outright. Salesforce does offer free online resource videos and guides. It has a dedicated user community, but more than these tools may be required to address complex technical issues unique to a particular business. Many companies seek Salesforce implementation partners to overcome various CRM issues and challenges. Salesforce Implementation partners are specialized in customizing CRM platforms to fit specific business needs that can take the company to new heights.
Unmet requirements:
One of the leading causes of IT project failure is inadequate requirements gathering. System requirements define the capabilities that software must have to meet stakeholder needs. The requirements process begins with discovery, wherein analysts document findings. To ensure that the final product meets business objectives, managing requirements throughout the project lifecycle is essential. Some of the standard requirements pitfalls include,
If you're experiencing any of the CRM issues we've mentioned or need help with your Salesforce implementation, we can help. Our team of experts at Minuscule can support you throughout the process. We have years of experience assisting companies to get the most out of their CRM investment and would love to put our expertise to work for you. Contact us to discuss your project and solve any Salesforce problems you face.
Are you looking to harness the complete potential of Salesforce Solution? Have a free consulting session with our expert team. We are ready to lend our hand to examine your CRM, Consolidate the Current Data Management, and figure out the inefficiencies that lay as a hindrance in harnessing the Salesforce power.
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