Evaluating Salesforce Automation Solutions
Using Salesforce automation to streamline processes and increase business productivity has increased sales dramatically. However, with an integration like the Salesforce Flow Builder, it is critical that you understand how automation rules work. There are two major classes of Salesforce rules that apply to activities in a sales process. These are call-outs and workflow rules.
Sales process flow is the ordered sequence of activities involved in completing a sale or order. In most businesses, there are processes that must be followed to accomplish each step in a sales process. Each of these steps is called a workflow rule. In most cases, the sales process flow consists of: calling, identifying customer, inquiry, quote, approval, check, and close. Salesforce automation can be used to combine these activities into a single, automated flow.
Workflow rules control which work items should be moved to a specified action, which are not to be moved. With sales automation, you can add additional workflow elements to a process builder. For example, if you have a product approval workflow rule, you could add a rating change wizard to a product approval screen.
When you use Salesforce automation in your process builder, however, it is important to keep two things in mind. First, Salesforce will log any changes made to your WFRS. Second, these changes are logged only once, so if you make any changes to your WFRS, Salesforce cannot retroactively change your approval rules.
While you can add additional workflows and activities to your process builder using Salesforce, you must consider whether these workflows or activities are essential to your business. For example, it would be very costly to replace all of your manual processes with Salesforce-managed workflows. Therefore, if you do not believe that your business requires automation, then you may want to leave the additional workflows and activities alone.
You must also decide what kind of automation you need. For example, do you need Salesforce flow builder, Salesforce integration manager, or custom reporting tool? All of these processes are available for free with an existing Salesforce org, but some are optional. In most cases, you should use a process builder with a sales and support component. This way, the entire business can be integrated, rather than having to develop and deploy individual processes from scratch.
The final decision you need to make about Salesforce automation solutions is whether or not to use Salesforce authorization rules. In simple terms, authorization rules are placed on your sales process and ensure that only authorized personnel have access to specific areas of a sales process or activity. An example would be if a user is assigned to check on a customer’s orders before they are shipped. Without the rule, this employee could easily change an order into a returned item, which would then create a situation where the customer would have to be re-activated and the whole transaction would have to be restarted.
By following these steps, you will be able to quickly and easily determine which Salesforce automation platform is best for your organization. You should also determine which components of the process builder or flow builder are essential to your sales team. Once you have determined which features you require, then you should compare each of these components to the requirements of your organization. This will allow you to choose which components will provide the most benefit to your organization and will also allow you to choose the one that best fits your salespeople’s work style and needs.
The first component that should be included in an automation solution is the Salesforce authorization system. You must include the rules that govern who has access to the various areas of the Salesforce automation application and the authorization process itself. For instance, in the Salesforce SL or Salesforce Ultimate Solution, Salesforce will include a “request-to-action” feature where a company administrator can approve, decline, or modifiy a workflow based on predefined criteria. These predefined workflow processes typically include the authorization process, workflow verification, and workflow approval. In addition, Salesforce automation solutions typically include an authorization page that is used by an authorized user to access application resources and information.
Another important component to be considered when evaluating Salesforce automation is the Salesforce approval process. One example includes the Salesforce SL or Salesforce Ultimate Master Role, which has an extensive approval hierarchy that allows authorized users to approve or deny actions according to a pre-determined hierarchy set up by the Salesforce application. For instance, a sales team may have a workflow that approve or decline product orders based on a matrix that contains salespeople’s contact information. If you want to utilize Salesforce, you must ensure that your application has a way for users to approve or decline workflows in accordance with the hierarchy established by your Salesforce automation system.
It is important to realize that there is no such thing as a universal Salesforce workflow. Workflows are dependent on the nature of the business and the salesperson performing the task. For example, in the context of companies that make and sell cars, it makes sense to have more defined rules for workflows that will prevent automated workflows from automatically rejecting car sales requests due to spelling errors or similar instances. On the other hand, Salesforce automation solutions that are heavily automated can allow a sales person to enter a specific sale and then rely on the application to perform the necessary approvals. However, these types of workflows will still need to contain detailed rules for workflows that result in a successful sale.
