SalesForce Training

 Simplilearn’s courses are longer and more comprehensive than Udemy. They include projects, case studies, and quizzes in addition to more traditional e-learning content. These advanced courses are highly rated, averaging 4.6 stars on Trustpilot and Course Report.

 Pricing: Simplilearn is a little more expensive than some self-paced learning tools. Two of the courses are $599 each. The third is a comprehensive certification course covering Administration and App Building. This one starts at $899 for self-paced training. The final course, a Platform Developer Overview class, is $1,499.

 Key benefit: Your team can receive comprehensive training to help them get their Salesforce certification, including practice tests. Simplilearn also offers a wide range of free articles for supplemental Salesforce training.

 Along with offering formal, comprehensive training, provide team members with supplemental Salesforce educational materials. With these resources, team members can learn more about difficult or complicated features without going through a full course and bookmark articles or documents for quick reference.

 Salesforce offers tip sheets and complete guides that your team can download, enabling them to work on their Salesforce training anytime and anywhere. Information sheets are available for a wide range of topics and use cases, including everything from Salesforce basics to details about using specific features.

 Consider assigning or recommending specific guides or tip sheets to team members based on the parts of Salesforce they are having the most trouble learning.

 Key benefit: Since the tip sheets and guides are downloadable, your team can keep them on hand for quick reference and access them without an internet connection.

 Salesforce’s YouTube channel is a great place to learn about new products and features or access relevant interviews and webinars. The company regularly posts information about new features and video guides on how to access and use them. The wide array of short-form videos means your team can quickly find guides for the feature they are currently using.

 Key benefit: Some employees may find the video format more helpful than written documentation. YouTube is ideal for visual learning because team members can see the task being completed on the platform instead of just reading about it.

 Given the widespread adoption of Salesforce, odds are that if you encounter a problem, someone else has had the same issue. With Salesforce’s discussion forums, you can see how others solved problems on the platform and crowdsource a solution if no one else has asked your question yet.

 Though many of the forum threads are developer-focused, you can sort by topic to look for sales-related questions or general concerns about using the platform.

 Pricing: The forum is free to access, but you need to sign in with your Salesforce ID to post or answer questions.

 Key benefit: Your team can get specific, direct answers to their problems instead of sorting through general self-help materials or product documentation.

 Consider offering your team multiple types of Salesforce training, including videos, structured courses, and text-based supplemental reading. That way, you can appeal to different learning styles, and every person will be able to figure out what method works best for them.

 Learning to use new technology, especially a platform as nuanced and multi-faceted as Salesforce, can be frustrating. Make the process more fun with gamification. Several of the training resources discussed above have gamification elements built-in. Salesforce Trails, for example, has levels and badges team members can earn.

 You can also motivate your team and create an air of friendly competition by displaying individual progress and achievements on a leaderboard dashboard.

 Salesforce has been the most popular CRM for the last eight years, and it’s currently running in 150,000+ organizations. It’s a massive sales platform with dozens of products and third-party integrations.

 As a large, enterprise CRM platform, it also offers endless customization and functionality than other options. As with complex solutions, the platform is also complex – meaning difficult application onboarding and training, as well as the need for continuous end-user support.

 Organizations implementing Salesforce should prioritize an individualized training approach by providing a plethora of learning options and resources, tailored to various users and departments, to ensure employees have support for their unique needs.

SalesForce Training

 A robust Salesforce training program will help set your team up for success, drive CRM adoption across your reps, and empower your entire sales organization to get the most out of your new Salesforce CRM investment.

 Because each organization will have a unique CRM that will likely be a combination of Salesforce products, third-party integrations, and possibly custom-built features, the skills your employees will need to learn will be unique to your organization.

 The level of customization available when using Salesforce makes it impossible to simply set your employees up with standard training and call it good. You’ll need to build a detailed plan that identifies all the information and skills employees will need to use the particular CRM you’ve designed for your organization.

 It’s not enough to say you want certain departments to learn Salesforce. You need to dig down and figure out what, exactly, each team needs to know in order to get the most out of your unique platform. Start by reaching out to department heads and asking them for a detailed list of what they’ll be using Salesforce for.

 Determine how many employees will need training and what they’ll need to learn. Encourage them to get specific. The better you understand how employees will be using Salesforce and how much experience they have with the platform, the better the training you’ll be able to give them.

 Obviously, you can’t implement training without funding to pay for it, so one of your earliest tasks will be to secure resources from leadership.

 Now that you know exactly what skills and knowledge each team needs, you can determine the costs. While Salesforce’s Trailhead training program is free, instructor-led classes can run anywhere from $300 per half-day for an online class to $2,900 per employee for a week-long, onsite training.

 Now that you know exactly what skills and knowledge each team needs, you can determine the costs. While Salesforce’s Trailhead training program is free, instructor-led classes can run anywhere from $300 per half-day for an online class to $2,900 per employee for a week-long, onsite training.

 You’ll need to decide which types of training fit your employees’ needs in order to build an accurate cost estimate. For instance, employees who will need to do simple tasks in the CRM may only need a half-day online course, but for those who will be spending a good portion of their workday in the platform, you’ll need a longer training that goes into more detail. Once you’ve decided which kind of training is right for your employees’ needs, you can add up the estimated costs and build a budget proposal.

 With Salesforce instances being highly unique for different organizations, exactly how long it takes to train employees isn’t standardized either. Add to that, people are all different and absorb the information at their own pace.

 If your CRM is fairly simple with few customizations and your employees have available time every day to devote to training, you’ll probably be able to get staff up and running in a couple of weeks. More complicated CRMs with lots of customization will take longer. It’s not uncommon for Salesforce training to take months or even longer.

 Many organizations roll out Salesforce implementations gradually instead of throwing a number of new tools and processes at employees at the same time. In those cases, it’s wise to also roll out training gradually as well.

 If you are using an implementation partner, they can help you create a realistic timeline based on their knowledge of your system and their experience with Salesforce implementations. Many implementation partners even offer training as one of their services.

 Remember there will be updates and changes made to your CRM over time and new employees will be added to the team, so training won’t be something employees go through just once. Whenever you update your Salesforce products and processes, make sure you train employees on all the changes.

 A major factor in the success of any project is how it’s communicated to the organization. If your employees don’t know what kind of training will be available to them, how they go about accessing it, and when they can expect to get started, they’re likely to feel frustrated and left out.

 Plan to start communicating about the training as early as possible. There will likely be things you don’t know yet because you’re actively working on how best to proceed. That’s okay — just be honest with employees about it.

 Create a documented training timeline for employees to reference. When that’s in place, hold a kickoff meeting to go through the process and answer questions from your team. Ongoing announcements and updates through internal communication channels, like Slack and email, are also helpful.