There is no doubt that Salesforce is transforming how businesses operate. Research indicates that companies utilizing Sales Cloud witness a 52% rise in the number of leads generated, a 27% increase in closure rate, and a 34% increase in sales income.
Making the most of Salesforce can have a significant impact on your business. The real issue is that most organizations do not have the requisite time, finances, or knowledge to take full advantage of the platform’s potential. Salesforce experts can help with that, with the ultimate goal of accelerating the return on your CRM investment. They make sure you undergo a company-wide transformation rather than just the application of a tool. They assist you in avoiding typical implementation errors and common pitfalls to make the most of this technology innovation to accomplish your goals.
It is the full-time responsibility of Salesforce consultants to be knowledgeable about every aspect of the system. They assist companies in making the most of their Salesforce purchase by drawing on resources including process documents, industry best practices, and hands-on training. Like with any big issue, there are occasions when an outsider can see the solution far more quickly and clearly than someone who is immersed in the minutiae.
So, is that outside perspective truly necessary? If any of the following 9 reasons hold true for you, it’s time you hired a certified Salesforce Implementation Partner.
You lack the ability to carry out a full implementation.
It may come as a surprise to you but studies reveal that over 60% of CRM projects are unsuccessful. There are several reasons why this occurs: Beyond “more sales,” leadership does not have much of an idea of what they want from the system; nobody tries to get end users on board with the new tools; training is inadequate or ignored completely; system setups are incomplete…. the list is endless. Sometimes companies have to roll out Salesforce multiple times!
Salesforce is more than just a new tool for your employees; it changes the way you conduct business. The platform is so vast that deployments take weeks, sometimes months, to design, configure, test, train, and integrate before they are completed.
It would be highly recommended that you engage with a Salesforce consulting company if you are unable to oversee such an extensive project. They will assist you in creating and executing an implementation strategy that is aligned with intended business outcomes.
There is missing or bad data in your Salesforce.
Are there redundant records in your CRM? Do contact records include a lot of blank fields? Do you have doubts about your Salesforce reports’ reliability? If any of those questions resonated with you, you likely have poor data, which is a common CRM issue. It keeps you from getting the 360-degree picture of customers that modern organizations dearly want, as well as from performing any kind of actionable reporting or analysis within Salesforce.
Since inaccurate data is the second most common problem among Salesforce customers, data cleaning apps rank highly on the AppExchange. A Salesforce consulting firm can assist. These specialists not only have a great deal of experience with this issue, but they also know just how to clean your data.
You have astonishingly low levels of Salesforce adoption.
Less than 50% of Salesforce customers have a comprehensive adoption plan, and 25% have trouble with user adoption. More often than not, this is a direct consequence of a failure to assist users in seeing the benefits of using a CRM. Without support, end users may believe that utilizing a CRM is just another burdensome duty they have to perform, a complex system they are unfamiliar with, or even a monolithic tool for micromanagement.
No matter how excellent your Salesforce solution is, it is useless if users are unwilling or unable to use it. Providing your staff with great software is not enough; you also need to mentor, encourage, and provide a compelling case for their adoption.
If your sales team is having problems using the new system or complaining about it frequently, you should listen to their concerns and determine what resources, internal or external, you might use to address those problems.
Although you may try out various adoption tactics on your own given the intuitive interface of the platform, Salesforce consultants can assist you in becoming successful much more quickly. They could make some quick and elementary configuration changes in Salesforce. Alternatively, in order to fully benefit from the platform, you might have to buy another tool or app from the AppExchange. Salesforce consulting companies are aware of several tactics for successful adoption. They’ll assist you in selecting the ideal option based on the unique needs of your business.
You lack internal Salesforce expertise
The benefit of a cloud platform such as Salesforce is that non-IT personnel can easily make changes to it without any prior technical knowledge. In an ideal scenario, sales teams should be able to iron out any issues with Salesforce on their own with the help of other departments inside the organization. Unfortunately, many companies do not have the time, finances, or IT expertise necessary to truly accomplish this.
For many businesses, hiring a Salesforce administrator is not a viable option. Here’s another situation where a consulting firm comes in very handy. They specialize in assisting organizations in maximizing the potential of the platform and possess extensive knowledge of it. Rather than attempting to piece together your platform using bespoke code, their expertise will personalize it in a way that is aligned with business goals.
You don’t have the time to maintain your Salesforce setup.
Improving the way your company uses Salesforce is a continuous endeavor. You’ll have to maintain users, make dashboards, correct mistakes, and stay current with best practices and new Salesforce features. You could include this in an employee’s job description, but those responsibilities could easily grow to the point where they take precedence over the person’s primary responsibilities.
Once the new system is in place, requests from users, executives, and leadership will begin to arrive, regardless of the size of your organization. What order will these be put in? When these requests arrive in someone’s inbox, will they be treated as a one-off case or viewed as a part of a holistic long-term Salesforce strategy?
Because of this, a lot of Salesforce consulting companies will take care of your whole Salesforce instance. They can also draft strategic plans and advise management on possible enhancements to corporate procedures.
You are unable to determine your Salesforce ROI
CFOs often struggle with this since they have to defend CRM expenditures. ROI can be shown in a variety of methods, such as an increase in sales per representative annually, weekly hours saved on administrative work, customer lifecycle mapping in Salesforce, etc. The ability to demonstrate a return on your CRM investment is crucial.
A Salesforce consulting partner will help you in linking the products you purchased with your business goals. Even if it means linking the ROI of your CRM to growth in your top-line income, they will assist you in calculating it. And in the unlikely event that you fail to see ROI, they can assist you with fixing that too.
Expecting Salesforce to define your business processes.
Many organizations make the mistake of expecting the software to define the process, when in fact it should be designing Salesforce to work with the existing processes. This is a huge annoyance to end users. In addition to being instructed to utilize new software, they also need to modify existing workflows in order to make use of the tool. Another equally irritating possibility is that the software just makes their current procedure more difficult to utilize.
Working with Salesforce consultants has several advantages since they are skilled at developing Salesforce workflows that make tasks easier for end users rather than making them more difficult or changing them completely. They put a lot of emphasis on thorough training and provide assistance with any queries or concerns about integrating Salesforce with everyday work.
Your customer data is stored in systems outside Salesforce.
Maintaining data about your prospects and customers across several systems might lead to a variety of issues, and it most certainly will. You may inadvertently send promotional emails for a certain product or service that has no connection to a particular set of people, or you may make a cold call and make a sale to a business that has been a client for three years. These errors create a bad impression of your business. Customers may even conclude from them that you don’t value them enough to comprehend their info completely.
If using multiple systems is necessary, at least they ought to communicate with one another. Is it truly cost-effective to have individuals spend valuable time and resources entering identical data into different databases? Salesforce experts provide strategic guidance and integration services for a variety of projects, from email integrations to complex ERP integrations across multiple systems.
You want more features from your Salesforce but lack a roadmap.
Developing your tech stack without a clear strategic objective is the quickest route to buying off-the-shelf software. Buying new software is easy, but deriving real value out of them is a different ball game.
A Salesforce consulting partner can assist you in creating strategic plans for your business and collaborate with you to decide when and where to implement new technologies. Certified Salesforce partners are consulting organizations with in-depth expertise in the Salesforce ecosystem. They can introduce your business to the countless apps on the AppExchange that can assist you in resolving your issues.
Want to learn more about how a certified Salesforce consulting company can improve your business productivity and accelerate your Salesforce ROI? Contact our team today.