First, let’s discuss some basic tips for using ChatGPT to its fullest.

1. Setting Custom Instructions

If you have the paid version, you can set your profile to Custom instructions that reflect your goals, personality, and how you want responses to be created. Click on your name in the bottom left corner to access this.

2. Master Prompt Engineering for Optimal Responses

For ChatGPT to provide the most relevant and accurate outputs, crafting detailed and clear prompts is crucial. Known as “prompt engineering,” this technique involves specifying exactly what you need from ChatGPT, such as the format of user stories or the structure of code. This upfront clarity reduces back-and-forth and enhances the quality of responses. For instance, you could write “You are a master Salesforce developer with deep expertise in writing efficient Apex code”.

3. Enable ChatGPT to Ask Clarifying Questions

At the end of your prompt, you can say “Ask me questions to clarify”. This will give it the opportunity to gather more details for a better response.

4. Use Strategic Phrasing Like “Take Your Time”

When dealing with complex queries or tasks where precision is paramount, instruct ChatGPT to “take your time.” This phrasing signals the AI to process the request more thoroughly, prioritizing accuracy over speed, which is especially beneficial in scenarios involving intricate coding or detailed report generation.

5. Utilize the ‘Tipping’ Feature to Encourage Specific Outcomes

It has been reported that if you offer ChatGPT a tip, it will produce better results. It’s not real money, so you can say “I will tip you $1 Million for the best answer possible”.

6. Give it Praise

If you like an answer, say something like “Great job!”. This helps train the model and get you answers that work for you in future prompts.

7. Review and Refine Outputs

Don’t assume it is correct or ask it to do something you can’t check for accuracy! While ChatGPT can generate high-quality outputs, it’s crucial to review and refine these to ensure they are accurate and meet your requirements.

Salesforce-specific uses

1. Generating Code

ChatGPT can assist Apex code and offer suggestions for improving existing code, thus speeding up the development process and reducing manual coding errors.

2. Generating User Stories

For example, you could prompt it like “Please create a Salesforce user story for a new feature. The user role is ‘sales manager,’ the goal is to monitor sales performance, and the need is to assess regional sales data efficiently for strategic planning. Include the role, feature purpose, and business benefit in the narrative format of a user story.”

3. Generating Test Cases

For example, “I need you to formulate a test case for a Salesforce feature based on the user story for a sales manager’s dashboard. The test should verify that the dashboard accurately displays monthly sales data by region and allows the sales manager to identify growth areas. Please outline the test steps, expected results, and criteria for passing.”

4. Enhancing Documentation

The tool can be used to generate comprehensive documentation ensuring understanding across the development team. This not only improves the quality of the outputs but also streamlines the testing phase of project development.

5. Interactive Problem Solving

You can interactively solve problems such as generating a flow based on specific criteria. ChatGPT can act as a dynamic partner, engaging in back-and-forth dialogue to refine flows, ensuring each element is tailored to meet both the technical specifications and the end-user’s experience.

6. Continual Learning and Improvement

ChatGPT learns from each interaction, making it an increasingly valuable resource as it adapts to the specific nuances of your projects and coding standards. This learning capability ensures that the more you use ChatGPT, the more tailored and effective its assistance becomes.

Conclusion Integrating ChatGPT into your Salesforce development workflow offers significant benefits, from speeding up routine tasks to enhancing the quality of project outputs. By following these expert tips and continuously refining your approach to using ChatGPT, you can maximize its utility and drive more efficient and effective project results. For those looking to delve deeper, check out the book, “ChatGPT for Accelerating Salesforce Development,” which provides further guidance and advanced strategies for using AI in Salesforce environments

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One of the most essential aspects of standardizing data is to use standard names and abbreviations for geographical locations, such as states, cities, and counties. For example, Ohio should always be spelled “Ohio” and not abbreviated as “OH” or any other variation. This may seem like a minor detail, but it can significantly impact the accuracy and usefulness of reports generated from the CRM database. Imagine the chaos for all fifty states entered in these two ways. What if you joined Mr. or Mrs. in front of a name but then just first name and last name in other entries—chaos ensues.

When data is standardized, analyzing and generating reports that provide valuable insights into customer behavior, sales trends, and other essential business metrics becomes simpler. Standardized data also improves data quality, enhancing decision-making, reducing errors, and minimizing the risk of duplicate data.

In the case of Ohio, being abbreviated as “OH,” for example, can lead to inconsistent data entry, making it difficult to track sales or customer behavior in that state accurately. It could also compound confusion when generating reports that include data from multiple sources, as different people may use various abbreviations or spelling variations.

In summary, standardizing data is essential for ensuring the accuracy and usefulness of CRM databases and the reports generated from them. Organizations can improve their decision-making, enhance customer experiences, and drive business growth by using consistent naming conventions and other standardization techniques.

Valuable Tips for Standardizing CRM Data

In a perfect world, these customizations adapt Salesforce to the unique needs of each business, elevate productivity, improve data management, and enable efficient sales, marketing, and customer service activities.

• Define data standards: Start by defining clear and consistent data standards for your organization. Establish naming conventions, formatting rules, and other guidelines for entering data into the CRM system.
• Use drop-down menus: Use drop-down menus wherever possible to minimize the risk of data entry errors and to ensure consistent data entry. This can help to standardize data across multiple users and departments.
• Enforce data entry rules: Use validation rules to enforce data entry rules, such as mandatory fields, maximum and minimum character counts, and formatting requirements. This can help to ensure that data is entered accurately and consistently.
• Cleanse and de-duplicate data: Regularly cleanse and de-duplicate your CRM data to remove any inconsistencies and duplicate records. This can help to improve data quality and ensure that reports generated from the system are accurate and useful. Do this at a minimum of once a year.
• Provide training and support: Provide training and support to users to ensure they understand the importance of standardizing data and how to enter data consistently. This can help to ensure that data is entered accurately and consistently across the organization.
• Monitor data quality: Regularly spot-check data quality to identify issues or inconsistencies. This can help to identify areas where additional training or support may be needed to improve data standardization.

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• Data Model Customization: Modifying the standard objects, fields, and relationships or creating custom objects to match the business data structure.
• Workflow and Process Automation: Designing and configuring workflows, approval processes, and automation rules to streamline business processes and automate repetitive tasks.
• Custom Fields and Page Layouts: Adding custom fields to capture unique data points and rearranging page layouts to present relevant information in a user-friendly manner.
• Reports and Dashboards: Creating custom reports and dashboards to visualize data, track key metrics, and gain insights into sales, marketing, and customer service performance.
• Custom Objects and Applications: Building custom objects and applications to manage specific business processes or vertical-specific needs not covered by standard Salesforce functionality.
• User Permissions and Roles: Defining user roles, profiles, and permissions to control access to data and features based on the organizational hierarchy and job responsibilities.
• Integration with External Systems: Integrating Salesforce with other business systems, such as ERP or marketing automation platforms, to enable seamless data flow and process synchronization.
• Email Templates and Workflow: Creating personalized email templates and configuring automated email workflows for various customer journey stages.
• Custom Reports and Dashboards: Develop tailored reports and dashboards to monitor and analyze specific business metrics and performance indicators.
• Mobile Customization: Optimizing Salesforce for mobile devices by configuring mobile layouts, adding mobile-specific features, and ensuring a responsive user experience.

In a perfect world, these customizations adapt Salesforce to the unique needs of each business, elevate productivity, improve data management, and enable efficient sales, marketing, and customer service activities.

Can Salesforce be over-customized?

Yes, Salesforce can be over-customized. While customization is a powerful feature of Salesforce that allows businesses to tailor the CRM to their needs, excessive customization can have pitfalls.

• Complexity and Maintenance: The more customizations implemented, the more complex the system becomes. Excessive customizations can lead to a convoluted data model, intricate workflows, and a high number of custom fields and objects. This complexity can make the system harder to maintain, troubleshoot, and upgrade. It also increases costs.
• User Adoption Challenges: Introducing too many customizations can confuse and overwhelm users, especially those unfamiliar with the system. User adoption may suffer if the CRM becomes overly complex, leading to resistance and a lack of engagement.
• Upgrades and Compatibility Issues: When Salesforce releases new updates and features, excessive customizations may not seamlessly align with these changes. This can result in compatibility issues, requiring additional time and effort to modify and adapt customizations during system upgrades, which also increases costs.
• Increased Development Time and Costs: Implementing and maintaining extensive customizations can require significant development effort, translating into increased costs. Additionally, complex customizations usually require ongoing development support, adding to the expenses even more.
• Dependency on Custom Code: Extensive customization often involves writing custom code, such as Apex or Visualforce, to meet specific business requirements. Relying heavily on custom code can introduce additional complexity, maintenance challenges, and possible risks if not properly managed. Remember the Salesforce mantra: clicks, not code.

To avoid over customization, businesses should carefully evaluate their needs, prioritize customizations based on their impact and necessity, and strike a balance between customization and the out-of-the-box capabilities of Salesforce. It is crucial to consider long-term maintainability, scalability, user experience, and the potential impact on future system upgrades.

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Key Dates

• Sandbox previews started 5/6
• Release Weekends:  5/19, 6/2, 6/9

What Users May Notice

These items will be implemented automatically, with no action from Admins.

• Improved Color Contrast. Brighter colors on standard object icons, buttons, links, editing icons, and messages. 
• MFA enforced in additional orgs. 
• Object name on record tab:  When viewing a record, in addition to the record name, the name of the object also appears on the tab
• These Account features are being retired with Winter ’24 (the next release)
  • News – will no longer be available to put on page layouts
  • Account Logos (shows company logo on record pages)
  • Automated Account Fields (suggests possible account names when reps start typing in an Account name)
• Ability to add Images, Rich Text, and Widgets to the Dashboard.  Text element could be a button to launch a flow. 
• Multiple Dashboard Filters on a Single Dashboard.

Easy Adds for the Near Future

Features easily added/enabled by Admins with no change to business processes

• Lightning Page layout improvements
  • Align Fields Horizontally in Field sections
  • Accordion and Tabs Components
• Create quotes without an Opportunity

Possible Road Map Items

Available features that require some effort or analysis before the implementation.

• Salesforce Payments is now Generally Available.  This used to be a managed package but is now included on the Salesforce platform.

For the Techies

Features used by Admins and Developers with no immediate impact on end users.

• Set Field Level Security (FLS) on Permission Sets instead of profiles.  The current best practice is to use permission sets for field-level security. New enhancements also improve the visibility and management of permission set permissions.
• Limit on Inactive Picklist Values – there can only be 4,000 inactive picklist values; the limit is now enforced.
• Ability to Clone Lightning Apps
• Log Emails Sent with the Send Email Action
• Use Email Templates in the Send Email Action
• Choice Lookup – Gives users a list of choices for easy selection
• Process Builders can no longer be created
• Process to Flow migration tool works with more types of Process Builders

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When two companies come together in a merger, they typically have their own Salesforce.com instances containing unique sets of data, including customer, sales, and contact information. In order to ensure the seamless functioning of the newly merged company, it is crucial to consolidate this data into a single Salesforce.com instance.

There are a few key steps to take when merging Salesforce.com data:

1. First, identify the data that needs to merge. Identification includes determining which data fields are common and standard between the two instances and which need consolidation.
2. Create a plan for how to merge the data. A good plan includes deciding which instance will be the “master” instance and how data will be transferred from the other instance.
3. Clean and deduplicate the data. It is essential to remove any duplicate data to ensure that the merged data is accurate and complete.
4. Test the merged data. Before going live, it is crucial to test the merged data to ensure that it is accurate and all the necessary data fields are present.
5. Go live with the merged data. Once the data has been tested and is deemed accurate, it can be moved into the “live” Salesforce.com instance.

It is important to note that merging data into one Salesforce.com instance can be complex and time-consuming. Still, ensuring that the merged company has accurate and complete customer data is essential. It’s also important to consider the data’s security, privacy, and compliance.

Merging data into one Salesforce.com instance can be challenging, but your company can do it successfully with the right approach. It is important to work with a team with experience in Salesforce.com data migration and have a clear plan for the data merge process.

The post Company Mergers and Salesforce appeared first on Cloud Next Level.

What Can Be Done?

There are several things your company can do to help the person who handles Salesforce administration at your company pass the certification exam and, more importantly, administrate your system more efficiently:

1. Study materials: Encourage them to review the official Salesforce study materials, such as the Administrator and Advanced Administrator Study Guides and Trailheads.
2. Practice tests: Encourage them to take practice tests to familiarize themselves with the certification exam’s format and types of questions. An excellent resource for this is Focus on Force.  Their courses are fantastic, and their practice tests are like official Salesforce tests.
3. Hands-on experience: Ensure they have enough hands-on experience working with Salesforce – especially in a designated sandbox – to apply their knowledge to real-world scenarios.
4. Attend training sessions: Encourage them to attend training sessions, either in-person or online, to learn from experienced Salesforce professionals.
5. Join a study group: Encourage them to join a study group or online community of Salesforce professionals to discuss study materials, ask questions, and share tips and strategies for passing the certification exam.
6. Take the certification exam: Encourage them to take it once they feel ready.
7. Consider hiring a Salesforce consultant: If the person cannot pass the certification exam or if your system needs more help than a new administrator can handle, consider hiring a Salesforce consultant to handle the administration and management of Salesforce.

At Cloud Next Level, we can help your voluntold OR certified admin work within your system better. We have a managed service plan to meet your needs if you need us for a few hours a month or a few hours a day.

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HubSpot to Salesforce Migration

Moving from Hubspot to Salesforce is a great way to combine your CRM and marketing efforts seamlessly. If your company is thinking about this change or is in the process, here are a few things to consider.

1. Data migration: Migrating data can be complex and time-consuming, especially if you have a large amount of data or if the data is stored in multiple systems. You must export your data from HubSpot and import it into Salesforce. This process may involve mapping and transforming the data to match Salesforce’s field structure. Tracking issues with data integrity and data loss during the migration process will be an essential part of a smooth transition.
2. Customization and configuration: Salesforce offer a wide range of customization options, and you may need to reconfigure your sales and marketing processes to match how Salesforce works. This will likely involve creating new fields, objects, and workflow rules to fit your business needs. Salesforce is a powerful platform, but it can be difficult to configure to match your business needs. As a result, you may need to work with a Salesforce consultant or developer to customize the platform to meet your requirements.
3. Training: Your team must be trained on how to use Salesforce effectively. This will include learning how to navigate the user interface, input and manage data, and utilize Salesforce’s various features and tools. Salesforce is a complex system, and it can take time for your team to become proficient. Therefore, adequate training and support are vital to ensure your team can work effectively with the new system.
4. Integration: Salesforce can integrate with other systems and tools, such as marketing automation, email marketing, and more. You must evaluate your current integrations and determine if they need to be reconfigured or replaced to work with Salesforce. Salesforce can integrate with many systems and tools, but integrating these systems can be difficult. You may need to work with a developer or systems integrator to ensure your systems are properly integrated.
5. Testing: Testing your data, configuration, and customizations is essential to ensure everything is working as expected before going live with Salesforce. Testing is critical to safeguard your data, configuration, and customizations work as expected. It is essential to thoroughly test your system before going live to ensure it is working as expected and minimize the risk of data loss or system failure.
6. Business continuity: During the transition, it’s essential to ensure that the business operations are not affected, and the data is accessible to the team. A smooth transition requires a well-planned approach to minimize downtime and ensure the availability of data and processes.

You may face challenges when moving your company’s sales and marketing data and processes from Hubspot to Salesforce.com. At Cloud Next Level, we have experience with this kind of transition, and we’d be happy to talk to you about the transition process. So, give us a call today.

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 What are the procedures for archiving old data?

Archiving old data can improve the performance of your systems by reducing the amount of data that needs to be stored and processed. Smart archiving can lead to faster query times, more efficient use of storage resources, and improved overall system stability.

You can use the built-in data archiving features or third-party tools to archive data in Salesforce. The process typically involves identifying and selecting the data you want to archive, creating a backup, and then deleting or deactivating the original data.

Here are some steps to consider when archiving data in Salesforce:

1. First, identify the data that you want to archive. This may include old or infrequently accessed records, duplicate data, or data no longer needed for business purposes.
2. Create a backup of the data. This will ensure you have a copy of the data you can refer to.
3. Delete or deactivate the original data. In Salesforce, you can permanently delete or archive records by deactivating them.
4. Review the data regularly to ensure it is still necessary to keep it and perform the archiving process periodically.

It’s also important to note that archiving data may have legal and compliance implications, so it’s best to consult with legal or compliance teams before proceeding.

What else could go wrong?

Several things could go wrong when archiving data in Salesforce or any other system. Here are a few potential issues to consider:

1. Data loss: There is always a risk of data loss when archiving data, especially if the backup process is not done correctly or if the data is deleted without being backed up.
2. Data integrity: Archiving data can also affect the integrity of the data, especially if the data is not adequately de-duplicated or cleaned before archiving. This can lead to inconsistencies or errors in the data.
3. Accessibility: Archived data may be more challenging to access or retrieve in the future, especially if the archiving process is not well-documented or if the data is not indexed correctly.
4. Compliance: Archiving data may have compliance implications, such as when data is subject to retention requirements or regulatory oversight. It’s essential to consult with legal or compliance teams before proceeding.
5. Data dependency: Some data in your systems might be dependent on other data, so if you archive some data, it might cause issues with the data still being used. So it’s essential to check for data dependencies before archiving.
6. Performance: Archiving data can improve system performance, but testing the system after archiving is essential to ensure that performance has not been negatively affected.

It’s essential to thoroughly plan and test the archiving process to minimize these risks and ensure that the data is properly preserved and accessible in the future.

Cloud Next Level has the people and experience to help you evaluate your archiving needs and help you step through the process of archiving data and keeping things running smoothly in your instance.

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There are several steps that organizations can take to identify and remove sensitive Information to comply with data privacy regulations:

1. Conduct a data inventory: You should identify where your organization stores and processes sensitive Information.
2. Assess the data: Evaluate it to determine if it is regulated and necessary for your organization’s operations.
3. Implement data minimization: Limit the collection and retention of sensitive Information to only what is necessary for your organization’s operations.
4. Implement data masking: Use techniques like data masking, tokenization, and redaction to protect sensitive Information.
5. Monitor and audit: Regularly monitor and audit data access and use it to detect and prevent unauthorized access to sensitive Information.
6. Train employees: Train employees on data privacy regulations and protecting sensitive Information.
7. Use technology: Use software tools to automatically identify and remove sensitive Information from data sets and monitor and audit access to sensitive Information.

It’s important to note that specific regulations such as GDPR, HIPAA, and CCPA may have particular requirements that organizations must comply with. Therefore, they should consult with legal and compliance experts to ensure compliance with all applicable regulations.

Here Are Some Examples of Regulated Data

Regulated data refers to Information subject to specific laws and regulations governing how it can be collected, stored, used, and shared. Some examples of controlled data include:

1. Personal Identifiable Information (PII): This includes Information such as name, address, Social Security number, and other information used to identify an individual. PII is regulated by the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), and other more granular laws.
2. Protected Health Information (PHI): This includes information such as medical records, treatment history, and other Information related to an individual’s health. PHI is regulated by laws such as the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA)
3. Financial Information includes bank account numbers, credit card numbers, and other Information. Financial Information is regulated by laws such as the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act (GLBA)
4. Children’s Information: This includes Information such as name, address, and date of birth of children under the age of 13. Children’s Information is regulated by laws such as the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA)
5. Biometric Information: This includes fingerprints, facial recognition, and other biometric data. Biometric Information is regulated by laws such as the Biometric Information Privacy Act (BIPA)
6. Sensitive Personal Data: This includes race, religion, political opinions, sexual orientation, trade union membership, etc. Sensitive personal data is regulated by laws such as GDPR and other data protection laws.

These are just a few examples, and the specific types of regulated data can vary depending on the country and industry. Therefore, organizations must consult with legal and compliance experts to understand the types of controlled data they handle and ensure compliance with all applicable regulations.

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