Top 12 Early Signs Your Salesforce Project Is In Jeopardy
“In poorly run projects, problems can go undetected until the project fails. It’s like the drip… drip… drip… of a leaky underground pipe. Money is being…
Processes
Top questions that define your project requirements
Each client is unique as a fingerprint, as are their processes. Hence, it is rare that a Salesforce implementation can be similar to any other Salesforce implementation. To implement the Salesforce project successfully, you must define the requirements properly. We, at You:Digital, have experience in implementing Salesforce for various industries and domains. Requirements, or Scope of Work, are at the core of our implementations and we take them seriously. We have proven and innovative ways of defining requirements for a project to minute-level detail.
As part of our standard processes, we ensure our potential customers know what they want before they come to our first meeting. Before you book a meeting with us, here are some “Homework Questions” (yes, you read it right - “Homework”) that will help you define the scope of work. You can download the Word Template or obtain questions from the list mentioned in the article.
We can divide the questions into the following categories:
1. Agile Performance Metrics
2. Functional Questions
3. User Questions
General Questions
1. Which industry do you serve in?
2. What are the vision and the mission statements of your company?
3. How many products/services do we have currently?
4. Do we plan to launch any new product/service during the implementation?
5. How many employees do you have?
6. How many teams do we have?
7. What is the reporting structure of your company?
8. Why is the need to implement Salesforce?
9. What do you want to achieve with this implementation?
10. What are the success metrics/KPI for this implementation?
11. When do you plan to start the implementation?
12. By when do you expect the implementation to Go-Live?
13. What is the budget for the project?
14. Have you procured Salesforce licenses? If yes, who is the Account Executive from Salesforce?
15. Do you need our help in procuring Salesforce licenses?
Functional Questions
Functional questions enable us to understand the business processes of your company. You should connect with the Managers or Heads of Departments of each team to get answers to these questions.
1. Define the reporting structure of the team.
2. What is the business process of the team involved?
3. Do we have internal or external approvals involved?
4. Do we generate documents with data inside Salesforce?
5. Do we need an e-signature on documents?
6. Who are our customers?
7. What do our customers do?
8. Do we have different processes for different types of customers?
9. Do we store data of our vendors and customers both?
10. What are the current tools we are using in the team?
11. Where do we store the data currently?
12. What is the size of the data currently?
13. What is the quality of the data currently? (level of duplicates, incorrect or junk data)
14. Is there any integration with 3rd party tool required?
15. Do we have any restrictions on the data visibility in the team?
User Questions
User questions enable us to understand the data visibility and data security of your company. You should connect with the IT department and the Managers of each team to get answers to these questions.
1. Which users will use the system and what will be the frequency. (CXOs might use it twice a week, the Sales team will use it every day)
2. Which tasks are performed by the different teams?
3. Which departments are affected by the implementation of the new system?
4. Who will need access to the system?
5. What data needs to be hidden from which types of users?
6. Do all users perform create, read, edit, and delete operations?
7. What is the source of data input?
8. Do we wish to send emails or SMS to our customers via the system?
9. What is the current automation for each type of user?
10. Do you want to enable users to access Salesforce from mobile?
11. Is there any territory defined for users?
12. Is there any hierarchy defined for users?
13. Is there any restriction on users logging in? (Hours, IP Address, etc)
14. Do we need to sync any user data to any other system?
15. Are there any goals or targets defined that users must achieve.
Before going to any service provider for a meeting, you should discuss and plan everything internally. No service provider can help you if you don’t know what do you want. We understand you are going an extra bit on your job to implement Salesforce. Apart from your daily tasks and responsibilities, what you are building with Salesforce is going to define your future of work. We appreciate it. To help you out, we have added a few additional tips that will enable you to clearly define your project requirements. Apart from the questions mentioned above, there are some best practices that you must follow while defining your project requirements.
1. Build your team by choosing a Single Point of Contact (SPOC) from each team.
2. Identify your goals
3. Identify measurable KPIs
4. Map out the business processes
5. Identify the reports you will need
6. Map out the input and output of your data points
7. Set aside a dedicated time (hours) for the new implementation
8. Send your findings and requirements for verification to the team
9. Meet with the team regularly and share updates
10. Identify your Administrator team
13. Share small videos about Salesforce with your team
14. Create a tentative project roadmap
15. Involve your colleagues in brainstorming
15. Do you need our help in procuring Salesforce licenses?
Implementing Salesforce CRM is a huge responsibility, let’s do it right with You:Digital. We understand you are new to this area, but we are the experts! Let us take care of your Salesforce implementation, and you take care of your business. Our main aim is to collaboratively deliver the most innovative solutions with certified consultants.
We, You:Digital, being a well-recognized and licensed organization, offer custom development for new projects, support development for ongoing projects. We have expertise in anything and everything Salesforce, including development, implementation, integration, and architectural solutions for any and every size of business. Contact Us to initiate a discussion!
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