If you have chosen Salesforce as your platform to streamline your business operations, then it is, of course, a wise decision in terms of ensuring growth. Salesforce is a great system, but it demands savviness for proper implementation and a deeper understanding of a business’ objectives and goals to customize it for the purpose. So, in order to ensure the best output from Salesforce, you may have to partner with an expert and reliable Salesforce consultant who can help you to achieve your goals through proper orientation, training, customization, and end-to-end implementation.
Here we will discuss a checklist to consider while choosing the right consultant for Salesforce implementation.
Checklist for choosing Salesforce implementer
Does the consultant have expertise in your industry?
One big thing you need to consider while establishing a partnership with Salesforce consultants is to see if they have expertise in your niche sector. The consultant should be able to understand the things most important to you and should possess expertise in the industry. Salesforce itself has emphasized the importance of industry focuses. As per Salesforce experts, successful implementations require product expertise, but the consultants should understand the business goals, workflows, operational practices, regulatory requirements, and overall organizational culture to do something good. The consultants also should have solid experience in your industry in order to implement your Salesforce project faster by following the industry best practices, which will ensure optimal cost savings in both short and long terms. Salesforce themselves offer tools to find the best consultants where you can search your niche among various industries as:
Healthcare providers, medical devices, labs, pharmaceutical, insurance, industrial, mining & agriculture, automotive, manufacturing, financial services, infrastructure oil & gas, hospitality, transportation, education, consumer goods, retail, entertainment & media, communication, not-for-profit, education, investment banks, commercial banks, insurance, brokerage firms, public sector, planning firms, utilities, emergency services, and law enforcement, etc.
Check for certifications
When it comes to choosing the consultants, authentic certifications are considered as Salesforce’s attestation of expertise. On hiring a certified Salesforce partner for implementation, you can be rest assured about the quality of services you avail from them. There are various certifications like Designers, Thinkers, Developers, and Marketers, etc., for Salesforce. Before checking for certifications, identify the apt ones based on your needs. It is easy to explore any Salesforce partner’s certifications by going to the AppExchange and navigating to the expertise on the app description. The standard Salesforce certifications explained by Flosum.com are as below:
- Salesforce Administrator features various subsidiary certifications as CPQ Specialist, Salesforce Architect, System Architect, etc.
- Salesforce Developer, which further has a different version as B2B Commerce Developer, JavaScript Developer, Platform Developer, etc.
- Marketer Certifications as Marketing Cloud Administrator, Marketing Cloud Email Specialist, Pardot Consultant, Ecosystem experts, etc.
- Consultant Certifications as Community Cloud Consultant, Education Cloud Consultant, Einstein Analytics Consultant, Field Service Lightning Consultant, etc.
Explore the case studies
Case studies are other ideal things to check out while reviewing the implementation partners for Salesforce projects. These are very helpful as they will give you a chance to verify whether the partner claims are correct or simply boasting. With proper data to back up their claims, you can trust the claims of consultants and rely on them. To do case studies, you can for their projects in similar industries, understanding the pain points and the results achieved in light of your expectations. As an add-on bonus, exploring the case studies will also help you to get a first-hand feel of the Salesforce partner’s style of project management, work culture, and technical proficiencies.
Salesforce Navigator status
While you start to search for Salesforce implementation specialists to partner with, the navigator status must be factored in. These will replace the old badges of Silver, Gold, and Platinum to recognize the size of the partner. Salesforce Navigator statuses will recognize the consultants based on their industry focus, expertise, products, or services. This is basically determined by the knowledge gained as the number of credentials, level of experience based on the successfully completed projects, and the quality of service measured by CSAT scores. The criteria set for this measure are much stricter. The Expert Navigators should achieve certain milestones and delivery objectives while driving customer success across various Salesforce implementation projects. Various Navigator statuses are like:
- Salesforce Navigator Expert as the most experienced.
- Salesforce Navigator Specialist II.
- Salesforce Navigator Specialist I etc.
Level of Responsiveness
It is a common case that once the sales process is done, papers are signed, and the payments are made; then the service suddenly gets slower and more impersonal. So, how can you ensure whether you are going to sign up with a responsive partner? You may get some reliable references and also look for examples of previous projects. Exploring these will give you an opportunity to comminate with others who have already worked with the partner in consideration, and you will have a framework to ask some specific questions.
App Exchange Rating
One easier and clear-cut method to look for the popularity and feedback of the Salesforce consulting partners is by paying attention to their AppExchange rating and reviews. This is one place where you can hear from the actual users who worked with the Salesforce partner and the candid feedback. Looking at the ratings can help you gauge which partners to be shortlisted. Looking at the reviews will give you a better insight into the strengths and weaknesses they have and how they succeeded the clients in succeeding in Salesforce implementation. You may just get on to the AppExchange platform, navigate to your partner page, and simply click on the Reviews tab to see the user reviews.
Along with all these, make sure that your partner of choice has a very strong relationship with Salesforce. Salesforce frequently releases new functionality and enhancements to help organizations keep pace with the changing technology and business landscape. So, the consultant also should have a stronghold on these changes by Salesforce to leverage all those for you. Overall, configuring a Salesforce instance for you should possess creativity and collaboration, so identify the right consultant to ensure optimum ROI.
