At Cloud 9 Strategies, we’ve implemented Salesforce for many, many businesses and nonprofits. Without fail, the product has proven transformative for these organizations by changing the way they learn about and interact with their customers, donors, and other constituents.
Convincing these organizations that Salesforce would be so transformative wasn’t always so easy. We do run into some pushback, occasionally, when we propose a Salesforce implementation. That’s because there are a boatload of stereotypes out there about Salesforce — all of which are ultimately faulty.
If you’re considering Salesforce, let us allay your concerns by addressing some of the stereotypes we most frequently hear.
“Only large companies use Salesforce.”
It’s true that many large companies have migrated to Salesforce. However, just because huge corporations use it doesn’t mean a smaller organization like yourself cannot benefit greatly from the program. After all, lots of large companies use software that your organization uses too, like Microsoft Office, for example. Does that mean you shouldn’t use Office? That a ridiculous question, right? The fact is that Salesforce is great for businesses, nonprofits and other organizations of all sizes. The best part is that you get to leverage the same technology that the big boys do.
“Salesforce is just for sales.”
Untrue. It’s much more than that. Salesforce can enhance your customer support, your marketing efforts, and many other aspects of your business. Of course, it does do a bang-up job with sales. Almost everyone in your organization can use it in some way, not just sales personnel.
“It’s just too much functionality for a small-or-medium-sized organization.”
Salesforce can do a LOT of things besides customer relationship management (CRM). The CRM aspect itself is richly functional, but here are two things to remember. 1.) Your organization might not always be small, especially if you use Salesforce as effectively as some of our clients have. As your organization grows, your Salesforce usage will likely grow, and that’s the cool thing: You’ll never outgrow Salesforce. At first, you can use as many or as few functions as you like. That’s the beauty of Salesforce; it can work for any organization, implemented the right way. Salesforce also scales as your organization grows. In other words, once you have Salesforce, you have the basis from which you build on for many, many years.
“Salesforce is difficult to use.”
This is one the most common stereotypes mentioned. It’s true that there is a learning curve for getting the most out of Salesforce. Any new software will take some time to get used to, but, once you use it for a bit, you start to get accustomed to how it’s organized and how it works. It quickly becomes second nature. Salesforce was designed with ease of use in mind. We’ve trained lots of organizations on how to use it and are always pleasantly surprised that once the employees start using it and incorporate it into their workflow, there are rarely complaints about ease of use. Salesforce success definitely requires you to tell employees how to use it, and what it’s being used for. After that, you’re off and running. Remember, Salesforce was originally designed over a decade ago for use by salespeople — who aren’t renowned for their tech skills. The ease of use has only improved over the years.
“Salesforce reporting is difficult to do.”
Actually, it’s a snap, once you have the reports you want set up. We set up reports all the time for clients, and we can teach you how to create your own.
“Customization means a longer time to implement.”
We’ve done hundreds of Salesforce customizations — and our dirty little secret is that we don’t have to write any code — if at all. Almost everything in Salesforce is customizable by simply clicking on things. Now, the nature of the customization — that’s where we spend a lot of time to get it right. Once we know what your organization wants to do with Salesforce, customizing it doesn’t take much time at all. One caveat: Integrating Salesforce with other programs that your organization uses will take some extra time (but not too much!).
“Salesforce is too expensive.”
There are actually many price levels for Salesforce. For nonprofits, 10 licenses are actually free! We can help you find a license that fits your budget.
Have we addressed all of your concerns about Salesforce stereotypes? Want to find out more? Get in touch with us. We’d love to talk to you about what Salesforce can do for YOUR organization… and get you set up with a perfectly customized solution.