Implementing Salesforce is not about financing a one-off project

Imagine the impact of your Salesforce investment losing value within your business. A one-time project investment puts you at risk.

Overall it's about a long-term continualinvestment and by not planning for continuous updates and enhancements, you're missing out on maximising its potential across your enterprise.

After the first implementation, I often see organisations hand over Salesforce to a support team, without ongoing planning or financing. This leads to organisations not maximising its value.

?? Future enhancements to your Salesforce cloud have not been budgeted for and do not get implemented. Salesforce is rich in features that support critical business operations and has huge depth in capabilities - something that will never (and should never) be leveraged in a single release

?? Ongoing innovation as part of the license purchased is ignored - 3 releases a year can swiftly go unused and organisations fall behind on taking advantage of new functionality. It's understandable - budgets are still thought about as one and done following years of IT projects being delivered.

People can believe a single project budget is enough for long-term success, thinking Salesforce is a one-off implementation. However, Salesforce is best done with a continuous level of investment and development planning to truly maximise its value.

Having your Salesforce solution going stale will put off your users and stop them from maximising its utility within your business.

To solve the problem of treating Salesforce as a one-off implementation, here’s a clear pathway to follow:

?? Adopt a Continuous Improvement Mindset

Recognise Salesforce as an ongoing investment, not just a one-time project. A business mode of support and maintenance whilst necessary, is the not the complete model for long-term high value success. Regular updates and releases should be planned for, along with the required business investment in time and funding. This mindset should offer your team the opportunity for continuous training on new features and best practices they can leverage. As well as empowering users it will support maximising derived value of the platform.

?? Budget for Ongoing Investment

Schedule and budget for Salesforce's three annual updates to leverage new functionalities as well as preparing for updates and testing of your own customisations. Whilst Salesforce will already run your tests as part of its release processes, ensure that you have resources to prepare your business for any changes as well as testing your own business operations as part of these updates.Overall this ensures you can adopt innovations and maintain system relevance for your users. Long-term budgets will give teams clarity and create an environment for smart planning.

?? Create a Cross-Functional Team

Involve diverse teams in Salesforce planning and updates along with a Steering Committee with a team that includes IT, operations, business units and Salesforce Success, to plan and manage ongoing enhancements. As well as encouraging collaboration, it ensures all departments benefit from platform enhancements that support and improve overall business capabilities.

?? Monitor, Measure and Adjust - your route to higher Business Value and Impact

Ensure you have relevant metrics prior to implementation so that a baseline exists. Regularly assess the platform’s impact on these business goals to ensure alignment and maximise specific ROI against improvements. Additionally leverage your Salesforce Success team and the metrics they can provide as well as using Salesforce analytics and feedback from your team to monitor system and business performance. Be ready to make necessary adjustments that optimise usage and business outcomes.

By following this pathway, enterprises can maximise the value of their Salesforce investment, ensuring it evolves with their business needs and the innovations that Salesforce release.

Enterprises should look to maximise the value of Salesforce by ensuring a continual investment, to evolve their solution with their business needs along with the innovations that Salesforce release.

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