Things to Consider Before Salesforce Implementation – Tips from Salesforce Experts

Salesforce is a World’s number CRM solution that bestows unlimited benefits to businesses from different industry verticals, irrespective of their size.

If properly implemented, Salesforce technology will accelerate your business growth by bringing efficiency to different departments of an organization like sales, services, marketing, operations, human resources, etc.

It is often seen that in the haste of adopting the technology business avoid certain aspects, which need to be taken care of at the initial stage, and in the later stage, they regret on avoiding those essential factors.

Are you also looking for Salesforce implementation services? You have landed on the right page.

Our team of the best Salesforce consultants has come up with a list of top things to consider before implementing the Salesforce CRM system.

Things to Consider Before Salesforce Implementation – The Tips from Salesforce Experts

Know Your Goal

The foremost thing to consider before delving deep into the Salesforce implementation process is to have a clear idea about your vision.  Make sure you have a proper answer to questions like why you want to go for Salesforce implementation, what goals you want to achieve in the long run, and what will be your parameters to measure success.

Concern Every Stakeholder

Salesforce implementation service is not a process that is performed in silos. It is essential for the business to involve every stakeholder who will deal with CRM solutions post-implementation. From top management to the end-users, the involvement of each person will be beneficial. It will streamline the preparation phase, implementation, and ongoing management.

Things each stakeholder is responsible for –

• End-Users – These people (employees or clients) are the ones who will be using the Salesforce CRM on the regular basis.
• Key Decision Maker – He/She is the person that has the authority to make a final decision like a timeline of project, budget, etc.
• Team Lead – A leader from every department – sales, services, marketing, etc. – that advocates on behalf of their department.
• Project Manager – An individual who is responsible to keep a project on track. The project manager ensures the productivity of a team and the outcome.

Set Budget

It is not advisable to directly hire a Salesforce implementation company because every company has its own expertise and accordingly has a pricing policy.

Therefore, make sure you have pondered upon the cost of Salesforce implementation. Budgeting is one of the most crucial considerations before implementing Salesforce.

Working on the budget is very important for the success & completion of a project. Few things you want to consider at the time of setting a budget –

• Cost of Salesforce license
• Cost of Salesforce consulting
• Cost of Salesforce ownership and leasing costs
• Cost of Salesforce training
• Number of Salesforce org users
• Cost of Salesforce migration services – data migration
• Cost of Salesforce customization
• The cost of ongoing support & services

Set Timeline for the Project

Having a set timeline is one of the important things to consider before a Salesforce implementation. And timeline can only be set only when you define your project goals.

Make sure your goal should be Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic, and Time-Based (S.M.A.R.T).

If you have answers to these questions, then you are ready to set the timeline –

• Are you aware of the challenges or pain points that the end-users are facing?
• Which task is the most time-consuming?
• Do you know a way to simplify your workflow?
• Is there any communication block?
• What is your goal to achieve after Salesforce implementation?

After deciding on the goals, make sure you set a timeline to complete them effectively. The Salesforce implementation process takes around four weeks to get completed successfully. Set a milestone for each timeline. This will ease the measurement of the project.

Need Analysis

Before the implementation of the Salesforce CRM, it is essential for businesses to nail down the needs of the business. It means that a business needs to understand and define its goals that they want to achieve through Salesforce CRM. Also, include all the stakeholders in the decision.

Make a list of what you are expecting from Salesforce implementation. Share the list with stakeholders, and sort the requirements from high to medium and to low priority.

Hire a certified Salesforce consultant for need analysis. Professional guidance will be quite helpful to you in conducting a need analysis. Salesforce implementation consultants will help optimally leverage the Salesforce solutions.

Hire the Right Set of Team Members

Having an expert professional throughout the implementation journey is important. It is essential for the business as a professional brings his own experience and expertise, which he can leverage to implement your project success.

A certified Salesforce administrator will help you identify your business requirements and suggest to you the best practices which need to be followed.

Some of the other essential team members in the Salesforce implementation process are – the project manager, consultants, developers, and QA analysts.

Their presence will help you with training of the team, data management improvement, integration with external systems, customization of the existing system, and offering ongoing support.

Develop a Project Methodology

There are two methods through which one can achieve Salesforce implementation. The first method is a sequential method, wherein it tells us about a traditional approach. In this method, businesses follow a sequential timeline to reach their goals.

Another method is the Iterative method, which is also known as the agile or scrum method. In this method, projects get broken down into small & achievable sub-projects. Every mini sub-project is well tested before it gets life.

Team Training

Implementation can be done any time after it gets thoroughly tested. But the important factor to consider before Salesforce implementation is whether your team is ready to use the solution or not?

Therefore another thing to consider before Salesforce implementation is to train and prepare your team. Make sure the end-users (employees or clients) get prepared and well-trained to use the software following the best practices.

Keep Implementation Process as Easy as Possible

Never complicate your Salesforce implementation services. Prepare an employee-centric workflow that your team feels easy and wishes to follow. You are implementing a Salesforce solution to make your process easy, so keep it simple, and do not complicate them.

To make things simpler, you can follow these tips –

• Start with basic functionality and start from it.
• Additional & advanced features can be added once you get used to the solution.
• Do not include complex functionality at the initial stage.
• Always properly track the features you want to implement in the future.

Arrange On-Going Support

Hire someone who will take care of the solution and its future-centric factors like enhancements, bugs, user problems, new projects, etc.

You can either go for Salesforce’s premier success plan, you can consider working with a fractional Salesforce administrator, or you can hire a Salesforce consulting company that facilitates an ongoing support process.

Conclusion

Before going for Salesforce implementation, there are many factors that a business should keep in consideration. We hope this article will bring some value to you and help you at the time of implementation of the solution.

For more details on Salesforce implementation, cost of Salesforce implementation, time duration of Salesforce implementation, and other factors, you can hire a Salesforce Gold consulting company like India.