How to be a Salesforce Consultant?

salesforce consultant

Being a person who has been with the Salesforce environment for more than 10 years, I always dreamt of being a consultant. The opportunity to work on numerous Salesforce implementations for varied clients in a wide ranging business verticals allured me a lot. I really enjoyed the process of understanding how companies perform their business.

As a Salesforce customer, I was associated with various kinds of consultants, some were very good and others not very good. However, what I always marveled at was the depth and breadth of their Salesforce knowledge.

Understanding Salesforce from scratch

I began my association with Salesforce in 2008 when my VP of Marketing told me to find the team for new CRM. I assessed various products and zeroed in on Salesforce as the required solution. I swiftly got to know that the potency of the tool lay in the platform and the capability to create new functionality that wasn’t very innovative. To put it simply, I got convinced fully that I should forgo AVP title for pursuing Salesforce full time.

One Salesforce Administrator post resulted in another and then finally I ended up being in charge of all Salesforce products for a pan Indian, privately held company with numerous business units under a shade. My task was to work with these business units to learn their individual business requirements and then devise a tailored Salesforce solution for their group in a manner that also integrated their data with all of the other business units within the company. Consulting was a tough task and when the time was ripe to take my next step, I felt I was game for the change.

Willing to describe my journey

When I began my quest for the ideal Salesforce consulting shop, I spoke to a few different firms that I thought was a perfect fit for my requirement. As I talked to several prospective recruiters one sentiment cropped up inside my mind. It seemed that only those who were consultants previously were meant to be consultants. I mean it was the usual problem of not being able to gain experience till you already have experience.

Eventually, I lended up as a Solution Architect at a reputed entity — but it was not a cakewalk. So, if you experience similar kind of feeling and want to get into consulting, here are some valuable resume and interview tips:

Speak regarding your internal clients: Simply for the reason that the product owners or subject matter experts that you associate with are working in the same company as you, does not imply they are not your clients. You get additional points for speaking about tough as nails clients and the way you handled them.

Highlight your work with regard to projects: Salesforce is a continuously growing product and it might come across like one giant body of work, however, try to dissect those features that were made into individual projects and speak regarding the problems and successes that you achieved during those projects.

Speak about certain business woes: We very well understand that the Salesforce is an amazing tool but where it actually shines is in its capacity to simultaneously handle puzzling business issues and make the lives of end-users very convenient, so showcase those stories.

Highlight the numbers: You can speak about the amount of time saved by your Salesforce solutions or a certain dollar rate of new business wound up as a result of improved workflow. This explains lucidly why your solutions got a genuine ROI.

I am of the belief that these tips will help you get your next or maybe first Salesforce consultant. I am working as a Solution Architect with Winklix for a little more than a year now and it is a call I am really proud of. All the best.

Thanks ,

Mithitesh

Salesforce Consultant

Winklix

Why has the Salesforce Marketing Cloud assumed significance among businesses?

Why has the Salesforce Marketing Cloud assumed significance among businesses?

In case you have a business or want to start one, what is the most significant thing you should work on? Without a doubt financial assets are critical. But, business isn’t only about trading goods or services. It is a must to have cordial relationships with your clients. Marketing is all about Customer Relationship Management (CRM). CRM is an integral aspect on which every business is based upon.

However, in case you require the best CRM for your business, you would want the best tools as well. This is where Salesforce Marketing Cloud fills in the blanks as it accelerates your business through specially designed tools. These tools happen to be technically superior and help you in knowing your customers inside out and this in turn, maximizes your profits. Hence, let’s delve into Salesforce Marketing Cloud and its various benefits.

Also Read : What is Salesforce ? It’s Features And Pricing ?

Main attributes regarding Salesforce Marketing Cloud

In a nutshell, salesforce brings companies and their customers together. Salesforce has got an integrated platform which aids you in handling marketing, sales, commerce, and services in one go.

‘Salesforce Customer 360 Platform’ is really trustworthy and you can count on it to get your work done. It gives an individualized experience to your customers by which you can gain other customers as well. If you employ Sales Cloud to tackle sales tasks and customer contacts, you’ll witness an increase in:

  • Win rates by 43%
  • Enhance rep productivity by 44%
  • 37% in bottom line
  • These apart:
  • Provide incredible shopping experience to your customers
  • React instantly to customer support matters
  • Automate time-consuming activities with customized apps and so much more.

Why opt for Salesforce?

Prior to getting into the reason behind selecting salesforce and Salesforce Marketing Cloud Benefits, it is pertinent to emphasize their values. Values imparted on their platform are unique in ways that they separate them from other companies in digital marketing solutions. Salesforce has developed a tradition and legacy of trust through which they encourage each other and the industry via their ideologies. Salesforce is devoted to transparency and total sincerity. They are of the view that profits can spike via honesty as well. While utilizing Salesforce users get several benefits. It is up to the user how they leverage the platform to enhance the scope of their business and CRM. These happen to be some of the Salesforce Marketing Cloud assistance.

Some of them are:

It maximizes your power to spread business across several markets by assisting you to connect with the bigger market. For example, you have merged apps with AppExchange, which helps you connect to the world’s biggest marketplace. Going by its name, it aids you in increasing your sales by linking directly to each customer. The sales employees in your company can obtain access to this platform with ease to learn the requirements of your customers well.

7 advantages of Using Salesforce Marketing Cloud

1.Customize with ease

Salesforce bestows you with the authority to customize online marketing tools as per your market base. With customization tools, you are free to offer a personalized touch to every customer devoid of any hiccups.You can even utilize integrated apps to learn about the several requirements of your customers. The customization aspect helps you in dealing with different customers in line with their issue. This facility apart from bettering your revenue also assists in multiplying customer base.

2. Aids in adapting to changes

There are some businesses that are very trustworthy and the reason for the same is that they have a good knowledge of the psychology of their customers. To take your business to new heights, you should be flexible enough to change in line with the transformation in the market. This is where Salesforce gets into action. It assists you in adapting to the change better in line with the variability of your customers. It even aids you in learning the underlying shift in the pattern of customers. Through this platform, you derive the power to make right decisions at the right time. This is the best part of Salesforce Marketing cloud.

4. Absolute safety

We are living in a world where data gets stolen every minute. Salesforce platform is ideal to counter such a threat as it provides ultimate protection against the misuse of data. By evaluating the data, you can secure your business from all threats emanating from cyberspace and your business rivals. It even assists in the encryption of data between your company and the customer. Also through Salesforce you can safeguard your customers from different kinds of stealth. And by providing high security, you can build loyalty and trust among your customers which can be beneficial for you in the long run. So, security is very vital when it comes to customer and company management, and Salesforce provides you with the same in abundance.

5. Increased Sales

With all the salesforce Marketing Cloud features at you disposal, the sales will also go up. The spike in sales differs in proportion to the security you offer to your customer. Also, it got custom-specific platforms and apps, which aid you in establishing connection with your customers via a single touch. This facilitates increased sales as well. Further, through data analytics offered by salesforce at an economical price, it becomes convenient to concentrate on big data to hike your sales by a huge margin.

6. Innovate easily

When the sales part is taken care of very well by Salesforce, you get plenty of time to involve with your customers and this leads to innovation. That’s the reason Salesforce is considered ideal. With this platform, you can come up with innovative ideas and execute them directly to learn the optimal returns of ideas. It is assumed that innovation can come out at any level in the hierarchy. Considering the same, this platform offers opportunities at various levels to every user. So as to have innovation to benefit the entire community and business.

7. Helps in making decision

Decision making is very critical in an organization. Now decision making can only be effective if you have administered information presented professionally. So, Salesforce aids you in better decision-making as well. The platform assists you by providing every information collected graphically. Also, it enables you in foreseeing the future trends, thereby rendering your choices very precise.

Spreading happiness

Armed with these features and your toil and diligence, delight of your customer is totally assured. It goes without saying that, if your customer is satisfied and content, you will benefit immensely as well. This is what Salesforce does for you: It can take your business to a new level altogether. That is the reason why Salesforce Marketing Cloud has gained currency across the globe as well.

Finally

In the end, it can be safely said that Salesforce isn’t only about buying or selling. It’s got to do with increasing happiness via connectivity and power for the benefit of customers as well as business. Salesforce tools are not merely materialistic assets, but they serve the purpose of entertainers, who give immense joy in several ways while toiling excessively internally.

How Winklix Enables Delivering Results With Fully Remote Team

How Winklix Enables Delivering Results With Fully Remote Team

With recent outbreak of Coronavirus worldwide , almost all companies have moved towards remote workforce . If you or your team is among one who is not familiar with remote collaboration , then this  might be the difficult time for you . Winklix has already well experienced with remote work force as we are six year old agency , and at every stage of work of being professional , we found effective remote work function gives best result with proactive and thoughtful planning .

We want to share the ways we can define our success journey with our clients – particularity at the time of social distancing with the help of different tools which only focuses on clear result in paramount . Below given are some of the steps which Winklix take to provide you with great experience and successful outcomes for ourself and our clients .

Project Initiation 

Setup is key to successfully carry on the work and organisation is gold . Every project is successful if you follow who , what and how approach . At initial stage , we closely take our client requirement in order to start their project . These requirement includes planning of key project events , creation of project schedule , project tools definition , collaboration plan creation that takes everyone on same phase . We use tools for conversation which we are already in use or even use tools that our client teams are confirmable with .
All the above given activities have been made possible by using tools for web meeting , polling softwares , group / individual chat applications . We are familiar with Zoom for video conferencing and Slack for real time communication with our internal team and clients . For further team work we use Google Drive , Microsoft 365 and Confluences .

Participants 

The Winklix project manager works closely with client team lead which facilitates updates regarding planning activities from time to time .

Project Discovery 

During project discovery phase , our team and our clients team come closer to discuss existing functionality as well as brainstorming on what’s else new can be implemented . We firstly focuses on pain points of our clients and then our business development manager come up with innovative plan to steer entire project with right framework and solutions needed to build perfect solution .

Participants 

Winklix in house team compromise of SMEs , designers , programmers , testers , managers , team leaders and more in discovery phase . Whereas on client side , in general product owners , business leads , products experts and technical team is present to discuss unique needs .

Remote Discover Success Tips

In order to get best result of discovery phase onsite meeting is always preferable with clients and clients personnel , however their might be a situation that not all clients may get present onsite and in that case remote discovery phase is what all is required . We have years of experience in conducting remote discovery with team of many sizes .
Here is Winklix’s key to make you successful in remote discovery phase : 

  • Quick Meeting : Conduct a quick video meeting with Winklix and clients team wherein the aim will be to introduce everyone , make them understand what all the project is about , how will each person will get involved individually and collectively and future planned activities .
  • Pre-reads / pre-work : Both teams are equally responsible to provide the necessary documentation in relation to project to be read in advance that helps in gaining insights about discovery phase .
  • Agendas : Always try to crystal clear the agenda in advance so that every participants can prepare themselves in advance for discovery phase . Always try to consider different time zones and remember that we are humans , and it is quite obvious to have breakthrough of mistakes .
  • Duration : This said , if you have a meeting which last longer than 90 minutes  , try to break them into sessions of smaller minutes . Try to also give clear break during meeting and finding engaging ways for persons who are present in meeting .
  • Audience : Although their may be times you may require many people to be part of audience in order to gain interaction and participants for given agenda , however you can on the basis of priority can invoice the audience .
  • Material & Preparation : As all team members might not be present all the time in future , always try to provide them with relevant material , flow , software requirement sheet and more during meeting only .
  • Technology : Winklix after listening to client requirement , tries to make familiar the client with the technology we are going to use which best suits their requirement .

Project Build 

Project building phase requires both client and Winklix team to work closely , all together . We try to facilitate all our works remotely by using different tools and with our active client participation , as after all we are making the products as per their demand .
At Winklix , we dynamically change ourself as per client requirement . We use to collect feedback and adjust between sprints . Some of the major benefits of getting into virtual environment is we saves travel time , can experience face to face meeting and can start direct conversation using Slack , setting reminders in calendar and more . By this way people closely focuses on their work , rather than wasting time on other non sense things .

Validation 

Validation is the time wherein we validate with our clients for the solution that is made by us for them  in relation to awesome user experience and satisfying business needs . In order to complete this phase , we make use of different tools like Jira , SalesForce DX and Circle CI to carry on our testing , revision and easily push adjustments from time to time .

Training 

As training is equally important as delivering the software solution to our clients , we help to strive companies empower end users with platform knowledge that can set team for success . We create various training material why is easily accessible like Trailheads , videos , knowledge article in Salesforce and more so that it can be used by present staff as well as remote staff who was present during training session .

Project Launch 

A project is said to be really launched , when our clients begin real use fo software and started gaining value from it . For almost all of our project , we use to launch it remotely . This helps our clients to enjoy the benefit of fully remote enablement . And then at last we work with our client to create a launch plan which includes final testing , acceptance and user enablement .

Support After go-live 

If you are adopting to anything new , you will always have sets of questions in your mind . Thereby it is important for us to answer every question that may arise after launch of software to enable our clients to effetely evolved with software along with their team . At Winklix , our project development is not one time thing , rather we treat it as ongoing relationship that can take on various forms and we always try to support our clients at every point of time during their journey .

End To End Support Irrespective Of Geological Boundaries

Although we only have presence on some countries of the world , we provide support services on global scale irrespective of different time zones . We have experience on Salesforce Technology , SAP Technology , Microsoft Dynamic 365 and remote delivery .

So in case you are in need of support services or want to fully switch to remote operations due to COVID-19 or want assistance in maintaining your Salesforce org at distance , contact us