The Road to Becoming a Successful Salesforce Consultant – Learning Paths Explored

Running a business of any size is not easy. It requires money and more importantly time to grow. Time is of the essence here and marketing strategies that boost sales and increase revenue are the utmost concern. Organizations are now venturing to hunt for the perfect tool that will help them run their business successfully by efficiently generating leads and turning prospects into customers.

Salesforce’s CRM is one such tool that aims to do just this.

What is Salesforce and what is it used for?

Salesforce is the company behind the leading and successful cloud-based CRM that enables organizations to achieve a 360-degree view of their customers. In short, Salesforce’s CRM allows organizations to manage information regarding their customers, prospects and partners, in one place.

Over time, the Salesforce CRM applications have become the #1 CRM solutions with more than 100,000 companies of various sizes using them. One of the major reasons behind its popularity is its ease of use – You can easily integrate with existing back-office systems as well as build new customer applications.

Salesforce is useful in the following areas of an organization:

• Marketing – Keeps track of various marketing strategies and its outcome.
• Customer Support – Keeps track of customer issues and improves customer satisfaction levels.
• Management – Gives the management a clear picture of what’s happening with its dashboards and in-depth reporting features.
• Application Integration – Assimilate with other systems using the AppExchange to amplify its functionality.

What other reasons make Salesforce so hot? (A Technical Standpoint)

To know about the reasons for Salesforce’s popularity will shed some light on it from a career point of view. The technology or the tool needs to be mature enough for it to be successful.

Salesforce can boast the following features:

• It is one of the oldest cloud-based CRM software solutions in the industry.
• Has significant experience in dealing with the issues faced by the customers.
• Has matured, modernized and strengthened its products over the years.
• Salesforce CRM can exponentially increase sales and improve customer retention.
• The tool is highly flexible and accessible from anywhere and from any device.
• Cost-effective for enterprises.

Now, let’s get to the meat of the topic – why and how do you become a Salesforce Consultant?

Who can become a Salesforce Consultant?

The role of a Salesforce Consultant is an amalgamated one. They are expected to play these roles and more (though not all at the same time).

• Solutions/Technical Architect
• Developer
• Administrator
• Basically, anyone with significant experience in CRM

What are employers looking for in a Salesforce Consultant?

In general, ‘Consultant’ is a position that’s attained after much experience in the designated field. Keeping the experience/number of year’s factor aside, let’s look at the skills expected from a Salesforce Consultant.

These are some of the skills expected by employers on Indeed.com:

• Good experience in Salesforce Development environment like Force, S-Controls, AJAX Toolkit, Apex API, etc.
• Good understanding of Integration and Configuration.
• At least 3 years experience in Salesforce.
• Any Salesforce certification.
• Sound knowledge on Salesforce applications, enterprise architecture and Cloud.
• Experience in leading Solution discussions with the technical architect.
• Defining solutions that leverage the Salesforce platform capabilities.
• Experience in defining Salesforce Release management plans and its best practices.
• Ability to work with technical team to transform requirements into technical Specifications.
• Understand functional requirements and develop technical designs, and assess the impacts of the design.
• Excellent analytical, problem-solving and communication skills.
• Exceptional listening skills.
• Perform independent reviews on codes developed by project members.
• Provide technical and functional expertise to the team.
• Develop project-level or application- or business-specific approaches and plans for testing, training, communicating, rolling out, and offering post-production support.
• Experience in CRM.
• Experience in implementing full project lifecycles in Salesforce.
• Experienced in leading requirements gathering sessions and documenting the outcome.
• Capable of effectively designing a scalable solution to meet client business needs.
• Experienced in performing impact analysis for possible changes in scope.

According to an article on Customer Relationship Management in Cio.com, the employers/recruiters need to focus on the following concerns when looking for a Salesforce Consultant:

• How many projects you have done and how varied are they?
• Totally, how many projects have you delivered?
• Do you have experience in the employer’s field?
• Does the candidate have good references?

Make sure you prepare well for all these questions. This is where your expertise can set you apart from others.

Now, on to the next big question – How do you become a Salesforce Consultant?

Steps to Become a Salesforce Consultant

1. Go through various job posting in job portals. This will give you a very good idea of which skills are high in demand.
2. Customize your profile to suit the desired and in-demand skills required in a Salesforce Consultant.
3. Connect with people on online communities that are relevant to the job profile. This will give you the much-needed inputs from people with hands-on experience.
4. Get the right certifications.

Certification is a wide topic by itself. Let’s look in detail the different certification required to become a Salesforce Consultant.

Certifications to become a Salesforce Consultant and are they worth your time

As you already aware, expertise in Salesforce is in huge demand. The Salesforce Certifications are industry-recognized and are a proof of your skill/expertise in Salesforce. There are three different routes when it comes to Salesforce certifications and each contains different levels and types of qualifications. They are as follows:

1. Certified Salesforce Developer
2. Certified Salesforce Advanced Developer
3. Certified Salesforce Administrator
4. Certified Salesforce Advanced Administrator
5. Certified Salesforce Sales Cloud Consultant
6. Certified Salesforce Service Cloud Consultant
7. Technical Architects

Are  Salesforce Certification(s) worth your time?

Yes, indeed they are! Certifications do make a lot of difference to your Salesforce career. Here’s how:

• Competitive edge – Employers give preference to certified candidates over on-certified ones.
• Personal achievement – You can show off to the world that you reached a level of proficiency in Salesforce.
• Get big bucks – Unarguably, Certified Salesforce professionals earn more than others.
• Climb up the career ladder – Certifications gives you an incredible advantage in your career. It opens up immense opportunities to prove your skills.
• Becomes an expert in Salesforce – Significant knowledge is gained when preparing for the certification exam.

Little More Information on these Certifications

Here is the list of the exam format and cost attached to the Salesforce certifications.

And, here’s the flow that needs to be followed for one to take up the certifications, from beginner to advanced level.

Conclusion

Salesforce is creating millions of job opportunities and looks to be a great career option in the long run. With the right skills and certification, you too can become a successful Salesforce Consultant.

Stay tuned with us for more such posts related to Salesforce!! You can also visit our website. Alternatively, If u want to learn Salesforce from our experts join me in the Salesforce Lightning course.  Zarantech will help you skyrocket your career with self-paced online training on various aspects of Salesforce and other trending topics.