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Businesses today are generating mountains of data and forward-looking business leaders recognize that there are critical insights hidden inside their data. With AI, businesses can unlock these insights to identify trends, opportunities, and challenges. Building a strong enterprise-wide data culture along with robust and trusted AI holds the key to unlocking these hidden insights. While business leaders recognize the value of data for decision-making, a recent global survey conducted by Salesforce amongst 10,000 of them reveals some interesting facts. 67% of them are not using data for making critical decisions like product or service pricing Less than 33% use data to drive strategies for new markets 79% don’t leverage data for diversity and inclusion While the above numbers revealed something unexpected, here is what the survey summarized. Companies that make data-driven decisions are more likely to beat sales targets than those that don't Companies that combine AI with their data showed an average increase of 30% in revenue Companies that embrace this approach are able to reassign human and financial capital quickly and can create personalized customer experiences much faster What can you do now? Here are some suggestions for creating a strong data culture. We will take these items up later in this article. Put together the right team Provide them with the right tools and training Test your theories on a pilot scale and iterate Prioritize the human aspect of your data culture Identify areas where AI can derive more value from your data Data-driven V/s data-informed In a data-driven company, most of the organization’s employees can access and analyze data, draw inferences about what it means, create a dashboard, visualize data, and use all of these to determine the next steps. Employees in a data-driven organization don't depend on data analysts to do this. Being data-informed enables organizations to make decisions based on a mix of data, research, experience, and insights. Data-informed organizations may or may not have the skills that data-driven organizations have. Why is it critical to build a strong data culture Business leaders have to deal with countless challenges before embarking on building a data culture. Avoid over-analysis by starting with a single use case that validates the value of your new data culture approach. McKinsey research has shown that data-driven organizations achieve their goals faster and their data culture initiatives contribute at least 20% to earnings. Here’s why this works: Data analysis identifies actionable trends Data analysis identifies patterns that unlock value and enable organizations to utilize opportunities faster. Adding AI to the mix can accelerate the process by doing a deeper dive into data analysis at scale and serving up recommendations. Combining data and AI drives growth, promotes innovation, fosters collaboration, and creates uniqueness. AI and machine learning increase success by 30% Organizations that still rely on legacy knowledge and instinct to guide decision-making are missing out on opportunities. With AI and machine learning, organizations can make quick and accurate decisions. According to Salesforce research, adding AI to organizational data and business functions eliminates the guesswork from the decision-making process and increases success by an average of 30% across important metrics like operational efficiency, employee productivity, and topline growth. Strategic work keeps employees engaged When decision-making is guided by data analysis, employees spend less time on mundane tasks that add little or no value and can focus on strategic or creative tasks. This keeps them engaged and improves their productivity. Salesforce research shows that 84% of organizations that have adopted a data culture observed higher employee retention. Empower the right team The best way to create a team of data champions is by showing not telling. Illustrate with real numbers how data-driven decision-making increases revenue and customer satisfaction and streamlines operations. Instead of choosing any random use case to illustrate your point, capture their attention by selecting a project that scores a financial win and one that you can scale for greater impact. Here’s how you can start: Step 1: Put together the right team Create a working group of employees from across the organization with diverse backgrounds and functions. These team members should have a collaborative mindset, unique skills and abilities, and individual organizational perspectives. Ensure that you include employees across the corporate strata such as senior executives, managers, engineers, consultants, and machine learning scientists. Step 2: Provide them with the right tools and training Salesforce research stats on data literacy don’t paint a pretty picture.  Only 35% of the surveyed workforce has received training on data visualization tools and 29% on statistical tools. 27% percent workers say they can interpret data outputs relevant to their job function, and only 26% say they can use that data to make decisions. With proper access to training on technology-driven data analytics, organizations can empower their entire workforce to unlock the power of data to drive decision-making. Step 3: Test your theories on a small scale and iterate Start small, analyze results, refine your theories and iterate. Eventually, a winner will reveal itself when your employees can measure the impact of your project on their bottom line. Step 4: Prioritize the human aspect of your data culture Encourage involvement of all team members in the entire process from setup, testing, fine tuning, to data analytics and its application for decision making. This will ensure that you avoid bias and guesswork which can have a negative long-term impact. Take data at face value to avoid bias by proxy. Let’s consider ZIP codes as an example. At face value, they are just a location indicator. But sometimes ZIP codes can be a proxy for an area’s racial makeup and financial services companies consider ZIP codes in loan applications. Decisions based on this data point must be free of bias. Step 5: Identify areas where AI can derive more value from your data You can start your AI journey at many places, in any department, for any function, or extend it further if you’ve already started. Start small, demonstrate results, and bring everyone on board. Establish guidelines and standards for consistency, security, accountability, and ethics from day one. Ensure completeness and accuracy of your data to make the best use of AI. Incorporating an AI-driven data culture can be a daunting task.  It takes time and effort to bring people on board, retain their interest, and demonstrate results. For most business leaders, this transformation may be a whole new experience. This is where working with a Salesforce Consulting Partner could prove to be very useful. At Girikon, our certified consultants can guide you on this transformational journey of embracing AI with a strong data culture. Contact us today.  Take the next step to build your AI-powered data culture.

In today’s increasingly connected world, data is the point on which the entire business world pivots. We are generating unimaginable amounts of data every day. And locked within these humongous stores of data are the insights that businesses can use to better understand themselves and more importantly their customers. To remain competitive, businesses need to do more than just collect data. They need to be able to capture and analyse that data and convert it into actionable insights in real time to succeed. Enter Salesforce Einstein Analytics Here are 40 reasons why Einstein Analytics is the no. 1 choice when it comes to data analytics for your business. Hit the Ground Running. Work with a someone you can trust: Enjoy peace of mind knowing that you are working with the world’s no 1 CRM platform. Cust Costs: Reduce operating costs by using a pay as you use cloud-based analytics platform. Say goodbye to expensive installation or maintenance costs, and onsite hardware. Get going quickly: Leverage powerful analytics within minutes, thanks to out of the box solutions. Cut out the fluff: Pay only for the features you use. Salesforce Einstein Analytics comes with flexible usage models, so you always have the tools you need, at a price that suits your budget. Customise your solution: Salesforce Einstein Analytics is fully customisable and can be easily tailored for your business. With Einstein Analytics, you can set up the solution that works best for you. Built-in support: Salesforce Einstein Analytics comes with comprehensive guides, tutorials, videos, and multiple support options across channels. Integrate your data: No need to depend on your IT teams to upgrade your software for data analysis. Einstein Analytics seamlessly integrates analytics tools with every application and system, giving you a coherent, integrated, easy-to-use solution that gives you faster results. Connect Across Departments. Integrate seamlessly with the entire Salesforce platform: Salesforce Einstein Analytics integrates perfectly with all Salesforce products such as Sales Cloud, Service Cloud, Marketing Cloud etc giving every user easy access to unified customer data. Collaborate: Collaborate across sales, service, marketing, and other teams with cloud-based data analytics that can be accessed from anywhere across any device. Unify your goals: Give your teams a unified vision and objectives they can strive for, with data that is insightful, reliable, and actionable. Generate stunning visuals: Use built-in tools to convert data into stunning insightful reports and dashboards for presentations. Get conversational: Leverage social media technology to enhance team communication, with Chatter for Einstein Analytics. Put it in context: Get consistent views across departments with embedded reports and dashboards. Be available always: Work on your data over any device, from anywhere on the planet. Analyse Your Business. Monitor team performance: Leverage real-time reports to view team performance and identify trouble areas early and optimize. Access KPIs: Discover key performance indicators across your organisation to ensure you do not deviate from the path of success. Track call-center efficiency: See customer support trends across channels right on your dashboard and make informed decisions to enhance the customer service experience. Empower teams to self analyse: Give your teams the power to measure their own performance and set new performance benchmarks. Find the Key to Sales Success. See the big picture: Explore all data in a unified dashboard. Get a 360 degree snapshot of the health of your business. Eliminate borders: Get a unified view of your business across geographies, products, customer segments and time periods, for a true picture of how your business is performing. Predict the future: View historical trends to intelligently forecast which strategies are most likely to work and which leads are the most promising. Reduce customer churn: Get detailed insights into each and every customer, deliver personalised customer experiences and ensure customer loyalty and retention. Prioritise leads: Analyse your leads to assess the likelihood of their conversion and focus on the most promising ones. Evaluate your lead sources: Discover which sources are the most productive, so you can focus your efforts where it pays off the most. Enhance the customer experience: Resolve issues and monitor customer satisfaction directly from within Salesforce, and optimise. Market Smarter. Dive deeper: Go deep into your marketing data and get a detailed analysis of funnels, campaigns, conversion rates and more across channels. Present the right message: Create messaging to attract your target audience, and get valuable insight into that audience. Be your own data analyst: Marketing data analysis is too precious to hand over to someone else. With easy-to-use tools and visually compelling reports, become your own marketing analyst. Take instant action: Act in real time with up-to-the-minute marketing data from unified dashboards. Specialize in B2B marketing: Leverage the power of unique and effective B2B marketing tools in Salesforce to stay ahead of the competition. Understand the brand experience: Analyze data to see what your customers see, and optimize the customer experience. Optimise Service. Set your priorities: Prioritise open cases with service manager, and give your teams a clear view of customers that need their attention. Evaluate your accounts: Identify accounts with the highest number of cases and highest opportunity. Connect with your agents: Get a complete view of agents and their cases, and assign notifications based on configurable conditions. Review your service backlog: Compare data and identify service trends over time to assess how service levels compare across years. Revolutionise Analytics for Your Organization. Integrate with third-party apps: Leverage advanced integration options for any third-party application and extend your analytics beyond Salesforce. Optimise your pipelines: Leverage data-driven strategies to manage your pipelines. Automate analysis: Salesforce Einstein AI is designed to automatically analyse millions of data combinations for informed actions. Data security: Share data across devices securely using the cloud platform security services trusted by over 150,000 businesses worldwide. Push the limits: Extend your analytics abilities with custom-made apps or find the right ready-made app for your specific analytics needs on the Salesforce AppExchange. Everyday, we are producing mind-bogglingly huge amounts of data. Businesses need to use that data as a foundation for data analytics, to understand themselves and their customer better, to drive enhanced customer experiences. Girikon is a Salesforce Consulting Company and has helped businesses across the globe achieve success on the Customer 360 platform. To know more about how you can turn your data into intelligent actionable insights with Salesforce Einstein Analytics, contact us today.

Powered by an extensive Salesforce Consulting Partner network, Salesforce provides access to expertise and solutions tailored for the automotive industry with their latest offering – Automotive Cloud. Automotive Cloud is a product created specifically for automotive manufacturers, supply chain partners, dealers, automotive finance companies, and their customers. Automotive Cloud empowers businesses to deliver exceptional customer service experiences across every interaction with Driver 360, boosts top lines with better lead conversion and improved collaboration, and leverages industry best practices based automation and real-time analytics for greater productivity and RoI. The automotive industry is going through a huge transformation as it gears up to meet the demands of today’s digital first world. Salesforce research indicates that only 1% of automotive customers had a delightful car buying experience, and only 25% auto manufacturers and dealers believe their business has adapted well to online commerce. To create new revenue channels and fix the fragmented customer experience, the automotive industry must recognize new opportunities with new selling and service models, connected and intelligent vehicles, subscriptions models, partnerships, and the heaps of data these new offerings generate.  With the rise in direct to consumer models and the surge in the adoption of electric vehicles, the automotive industry is in the midst of a new digital imperative. Automakers today recognize that with disruption comes opportunity, and businesses embracing the digital-first future with a technology platform like Automotive Cloud can have a competitive edge going into the future. According to Salesforce, over 90% of automotive industry leaders recognize that first-party data can help significantly improve the customer experience across every interaction – like vehicle browsing, purchasing, financing, or service. Automotive Cloud, powered by Driver 360, and built on automated, intelligent and real-time technology, delivers a unified view of the customer and vehicle lifecycle for auto manufacturers, supply chain partners, dealers, and finance agencies. Just like Education 360 for learning and Patient 360 for healthcare, Driver 360 is built on the powerful Customer 360 platform and delivers a single source of truth for the entire automotive industry. Whether consumers are surfing for a new car, completing a purchase, looking for vehicle financing, or want to get their vehicle serviced, Automotive Cloud is poised to drive the automotive industry through this phase of unprecedented transformation by enabling real-time intelligent personalization across the entire journey of the vehicle. With Automotive Cloud, marketers can configure ranking parameters to qualify leads to share the leads most likely to convert with the customer’s local dealer. Dealer managers can track the performance of their inventory to discover how dealers are performing to improve how they manage their inventory and vehicle allocation. Service teams can configure alerts to notify them when a service is due. And IT teams can build custom workflows with just a few clicks to automatically alert customers in case of a vehicle recall of a particular model. Driver 360 empowers you to deliver best-in-class customer experiences Driver 360 comes pre-built with industry specific best practices based on out-of-the-box solutions built on verified data models for the auto industry to fast track time to value. With Driver Console, service teams can get a comprehensive view of all customer interactions and alerts across every touchpoint throughout the customer and vehicle journey, including car browsing, purchasing to vehicle servicing. With the Household Management feature, automotive businesses can aggregate their data to build a 360 degree picture of a household’s vehicle ownership and past interactions, which the dealers and other partners can use to offer personalize support and offers. With Vehicle Console, staff across automakers, dealers and finance agencies can get easy access to holistic vehicle information like odometer readings, current market value of the vehicle and real-time service and repair information.  Automotive Data Foundation, which has been built on industry standards, is the cornerstone of Automotive Cloud. It creates a trusted data foundation that allows for interoperability, compliances, data protection and data sharing. Drive revenue through better lead conversion and communication Today’s customers prefer digital first engagement. Which means automotive businesses, dealers and partners need to collaborate seamlessly to drive sales, manage inventory, and deliver enhanced customer experiences.  Automotive Lead Management encourages collaboration right across the value chain that includes automotive manufacturers and dealers. It enriches leads by providing comprehensive  customer and vehicle history, enabling users to direct the high priority leads directly to the customer’s preferred dealer coupled with comprehensive information about their preferences, needs, and interaction history. Dealership performance can be easily analysed by region and lead pipelines can be monitored better with Dealer Performance Management. This enables auto businesses to focus their efforts and facilitate better coordination across sales agreements, customer visits, partner affiliations, forecasts, incentives, and much more. Powerful AI and analytics for increased productivity and cost savings with industry-specific automation, With rising prices of raw material and parts, supply chain limitations, and huge investments in EVs, automotive businesses need smart automation, AI, intelligent analytics based on seamlessly connected data to lower costs, identify new streams of revenue and empower users to make better informed decisions. Flow for Automotive Cloud allows users to build and deploy intelligent workflow automation with just a few clicks. Flow’s integration and configuration capability makes it easy to create and deploy branded automation experiences like order status updates or delay notifications to enable users to accomplish more tasks with lesser resources, improve efficiency, and deliver enhanced customer experiences at scale. With Analytics for Automotive Cloud, automakers can get deep insights to track and improve business performance. Analytics comes with purpose-built dashboards and views that give business users a detailed snapshot of business performance, customer and vehicle lifecycle, and trends, to yield faster and better business outcomes. With Salesforce Genie, automotive businesses can unify complete customer and vehicle data across multiple channels across all interactions by aggregating vehicle, service and interaction data into a unified, real-time, customer profile. With Automotive Cloud you can deliver unified purchase and service experiences. It empowers you to automate processes, get intelligent insights. Now you can transform customer insights into real time, rich, seamless experiences. Get an enriched view of your customers, households, vehicles, and assets to enable real-time, purposeful engagements. Automate business processes easily with just a few clicks. Simplify integrations across automakers, partners and collaborators and deliver branded experiences with just a few clicks with Flow for Automotive Cloud. Get intelligent insights and make better informed decisions. Customer facing teams can use the power of AI to engage smartly with customers across every touchpoint. Drive real-time, engaging experiences. Drive sales and service. Delight customers throughout the entire sales and service journey with a solution purpose built for the automotive industry. Here’s what you get with Automotive Cloud to power customer engagement. Driver Console Get a 360-degree view of all customer interactions and easily configure custom alerts for your teams. Vehicle Console Access important information such as vehicle details, warranties, or service reports. Household Management View complete history of a household’s owners and vehicles to deliver personalised support and offers. Automotive Lead Management Forward high-priority leads directly to the customer’s preferred dealer. Partner Performance Management Easily track performance of partners and seamlessly collaborate on site visits, incentives, and more. Automotive Data Foundation Ensure data protection, compliances, and data sharing. As a  Salesforce Consultant, Girikon recognizes that Automotive Cloud comes with limitless possibilities to enable automotive companies make their business future proof. To know more about how you can leverage AI, Automation and Analytics to significantly improve decision making, drive efficiency and boost revenues for your automotive business, contact one of our experts today.

The latest Summer '23 features have been released by Salesforce.  If you are looking to upgrade your Salesforce instance, the right Salesforce Implementation Partner can help you with the implementation of these new features and training of your Salesforce admins to make your operations more efficient and productive.  Here’s a look at the top 10 features from the Latest Salesforce Summer ’23 Release 1. Integrated Analytics Services The summer ’23 release comes with a consolidated interface for Analytics and Slack. Which means you can now enjoy a seamless engagement with all your CRM Analytics, Lightning reports and dashboards, and Einstein Discovery models and forecasts. The Analytics tab now comes with powerful search capabilities and recommendations, giving you access to organized statistics that you can turn to for all your Lightning dashboards and CRM Analytics. Using the Post to Slack feature on Lightning dashboards, you can share information such as dashboards and CRM data with colleagues throughout Slack workspaces easily. 2. Unified Analytics With the new release of Analytics Home, you no longer need to deal with analytics spread over different products. This new feature unifies all your CRM analytics data in a single place, allowing you easy access to information. Now you can get access to a consolidated view of all your CRM reports and dashboards in a structured and organised way, so you can easily access all the information you need to take quick decisions. 3. Customer Data Platform reimagined as Data Cloud In the new release, Salesforce has transformed the erstwhile Customer Data Platform into Salesforce Data Cloud with all the necessary documentation and additional features. 4. Barring Unverified Emails Sent by Guest Users This feature update disallows companies from sending emails from unverified email addresses of guest users. However, Salesforce customers that have a validated company-wide email address will not be impacted by this update. In such cases, the sender’s email address always updates to the authenticated email address. With the Latest Summer ’23 release, this enforced change effectively disallows shadowy emails from being sent by a guest user using an unverified email address. 5. Upgrade to Hyperforce Using Hyperforce Assistant The latest Summer ’23 release comes with Hyperforce Assistant which streamlines the upgrade to Hyperforce. The new Hyperforce Assistant comes with the latest Hyperforce messaging authorization feature that has better in-built reference checks to support Salesforce organizations that have a large number of Apex classes. Hyperforce Assistant is available in all editions of Salesforce Lightning as well as Classic. Once admins schedule the upgrade, they will be asked to initiate the assistant. Admins can activate the assistant manually in case you are scheduled for a major migration. During Setup, you can enter “Hyperforce Assistant” in the Quick Find Box and select the appropriate option. 6. Accelerated Quote Template Creation With OmniStudio Document Generation Quote generation is now much simpler with this latest add on. With Salesforce CPQ Plus, your reps can easily create templates to generate quotes for your customers. You can generate a Microsoft Word file in the format and language of your preference, insert tokens and upload the document. Then associate the inserted tokens with relevant Salesforce fields. Your sales reps can then start utilizing the template once it is active. They can also easily convert their documents to PDFs. This Salesforce CPQ plus update is available in both Salesforce Classic and Lightning Experience. 7. Real-Time Collaboration with Partner Relationship Management for Slack App This feature improves communication and collaboration across internal teams and external partners by bringing them together in a single channel using Slack. With Slack you can automate key business processes, and update and share records easily across collaborators. Partner Relationship Management for Slack connects your Salesforce CRM with partners seamlessly, with easy access to important information through partner portals, thereby boosting productivity, and fostering better communication. This upgrade impacts the Enterprise and Unlimited editions of Salesforce. The mandatory requirement to access this feature upgrade is to be a Slack Enterprise Grid user. 8. Codeless flow of External Data into Flow Builder This new feature allows admins to use Flow Builder to automate processes that involve external data without the need for coding by developing an HTTP callout action through a web service API. Once you enter the API details, Flow Builder automatically generates a reusable callout action which admins can immediately deploy in Flow Builder and across Salesforce. This commonly used feature has witnessed several enhancements since the last update. Now it is easier to configure and edit the API responses to HTTP callouts. This allows the use of external data inflows to be simpler and more declarative. This upgrade is available across all editions of the Lightning Experience – Enterprise, Performance, Unlimited and Developer. The reason why this feature has been introduced is that APIs often go through modifications, such as the addition of a new field or updation in an existing field in an external system. Admins with the relevant permissions in Manage Flow and Customize Applications can create an HTTP callout action. Previously, admins had to modify the auto-generated API definition in JSON to modify the HTTP callout action. With the latest update, this action can be modified with just a few clicks. Instead of editing and configuring JSON to parse the API response, admins can easily select data types for fields. With this new feature, admins will also receive more lucid error messages, simplifying the troubleshooting process and prevent runtime issues. 9. Quick Create Sandbox to Enhance Productivity Quick Create Full Sandbox is another new upcoming feature of the Salesforce’s Summer 23 Release. This feature accelerates sandbox creation and refreshing. This update means no additional actions will be required from Salesforce admins as it is the default setting. This feature will be available on eligible Hyperforce instances. Salesforce will initiate a staggered release after June 10, 2023, and users with the Manage Sandbox permission can use this feature. 10. Process Builder is on its way out. Rules have changed. Process Builder does not have the capability of adding new processes anymore. However, you can still activate/deactivate existing processes or edit them. Having said that, it is recommended that for most use cases, you migrate to Flow Builder.  The upgraded flow builder can take automation of business processes to a whole new level. Summing Up With the Summer ’23 release, Salesforce endeavours to make your daily tasks simpler, more efficient, and productive. The Summer ’23 release is designed to empower organizations to improve their engagement with customers, automate businesses processes, and drive growth. At Girikon, a Gold Salesforce Consulting Partner, we recognize that staying up-to-date with these new changes in the Salesforce platform and leveraging the new capabilities are key to maximizing your Salesforce RoI.  Contact one of our experts today to know more about how you can make the most of these exciting new features of the Summer ’23 Release.

In today’s pandemic context, businesses around the world have embraced digital transformation to re-imagine their internal processes. In partnership with global Salesforce Consultants, the Customer 360 platform has helped organizations witness exponential growth in lead conversion and customer satisfaction scores. And with digital transformation, there has been growing need to make the platform available to field services. And that led to the birth of Salesforce Field Service Lightning. Salesforce Field Service is a solution that extends the power and flexibility of the Salesforce platform to field service operations. Multiple teams across geographies can be easily connected to everyday field service tasks that require site visits in real time. What Is Salesforce Field Service Lightning? Salesforce Field Service Lightning is Salesforce’s new offering as part of its Customer-360 platform to augment the customer experience through field services. One of the hallmarks of Salesforce CRM is the 360-degree insight on customers. With Field Service Lightning, customer information percolates downstream to the field service agents. Along with that, Salesforce also provides a Field Service learning map, a handy resource to guide you on your path to Field Service success. Let’s dive deeper into the key functions of Salesforce Field Service Lightning to understand why it’s useful for businesses. Task Assignment This is perhaps the most attractive feature of Salesforce Field Service Lightning. With this function, you can quickly create tasks for your field service agents and track the tasks assigned in real time. Standard activities such as appointments, maintenance tasks and other field activities can be easily managed by the field agents and technicians. And because of the fully integrated capability of the Salesforce platform, Field Service Lightning comes integrated with contacts, accounts, cases, and other items. You can get access to knowledge articles and real time tracking of SLA compliance with relevant milestone tracking or visit resolution. Service and Resource Allocation Field Service also allows you to automatically customise and assign tasks as per company guidelines. And not just that,  it also allows you to book appointments easily based on customer data and tailor the relevant tool for a particular task based on  capacity, location, and business rules. Customers can also auto-book an appointment conveniently. Real Time Inventory  Using the Field Service mobile app, you can view the assets installed at client locations using the barcode scan function. You can scan team barcodes and update the inventory available with a particular truck. This allows the field technician to easily manage the tools inventory and materials that is being transported to the customer. The required field service tasks can be associated with both the inventory required for the task as well as the skills required to complete them. You can configure multiple storage locations for materials and tools which could be fixed locations such as warehouses as well as mobile inventory such as trucks or backpacks. Dispatcher Console You can easily assign tasks and link it to the right agent based on multiple criteria such as work location, required knowledge to accomplish the task, agent availability, and much more. The dispatcher can get a complete view of all scheduled appointments, their stratus updates, with alerts for issues that require urgent intervention. The field service map shows you the status of the service task in real time, showing the current location of the both the technician as well as the client. With this feature, tracking and management of field technicians becomes more efficient. Field Service App Using the Field Service Mobile app, the field technicians can view the list of pending tasks for the day in real time. Tasks can be viewed in 2 ways: a sequential list for the day ahead or a map that shows the route to follow. Technicians can also fill in the necessary information required to complete the task. The app also provides relevant guidance to the technician to ensure that the necessary steps are followed to confirm the appointment, making their job easier. Field Service Lightning comes integrated with Chatter. This allows field technicians to share updates with other technicians or the dispatcher in real time. Customers can sign on the app itself and technicians can create service reports by having a digital document about the job. The app also works seamlessly in offline mode, which may be necessary in remote areas.  In offline mode, all Field Service functions are available in the app. This allows technicians to complete tasks in areas where there is limited or no mobile service. Technicians no longer have to be limited by circumstances and can deliver great customer service everywhere. Data Analysis Salesforce has set a gold standard when it comes to data analysis and Field Service Lightning is no different. In Field Service, you can easily perform data analysis on the go with just a few taps. You can create comprehensive custom views of technicians, supervisors, and third party contractors. Salesforce Field Service Lightning allows you to easily integrate all data from multiple systems making service and its supervision possible. 4 Advantages of Salesforce Field Service Lightning Salesforce Field Service Lightning integrates seamlessly with tools of the Salesforce ecosystem such as Service Cloud to deliver greater efficiency and productivity. Shift Management Organizing field service teams in shifts and complex trip management is a thing of the past. Salesforce Field Service Lightning is built on an object model that allows for improved and easy management of these processes. Supervisors and managers can easily manage resources and shifts and relieve administrators of unnecessary heavy lifting of mundane tasks. Dependencies Linking tasks can now be done easily with Field Service Lightning. More often than not, tasks have dependences and its critical to correlate them to maintain service levels. This is particularly helpful in scenarios where a particular work order has multiple tasks that must be completed. Service Groups This allows field service agents to work as a collaborative team for easier planning and execution of field service tasks. This brings in fluidity to the entire service operations. More often than not, field service teams work under the assumption that everyone has similar skills, which limits a work order to be able to allocate resources using a combination of skills. For instance, if you need a carpenter and a plumber, they should be assigned to different service appointments with the same start dependencies amongst them. This feature comes in handy for certain scenarios such as professional services or complex engineering. Salesforce is committed to continue its technology innovation to bring value to its customers, their employees and partners across industries. Field Service offers a significant improvement for your business, covering all your task and logistic management needs and ensures that your field service agents can spend most of their time on what they do best and not in mundane,  repetitive tasks. At Girikon, a Gold Salesforce Partner, we offer consulting, implementation, and training across the entire spectrum of Salesforce products. To know more about how Salesforce Field Service Lightning can significantly improve the efficiency of your field service operations, contact us today.

Global Digital Skills Index from Salesforce research conducted in 2022 indicates a growing digital skills crisis. The in-depth research about digital skills is based on a survey with 23,000+ respondents (existing and prospective workers) across 19 countries. It includes areas such as their impact on the future of work, their job readiness concerns, and the importance of continuous up-skilling.

Customers are very demanding today, primarily because of the options available to them. When they reach out to a brand for support, they expect minimal wait times and fast resolution, regardless of the channel they use. Agents, however, have limited bandwidth and can only handle a limited number of cases at a time. So how does one scale customer support? Enter chatbots. But what exactly is a chatbot? That’s a significant question considering the fact that this technology is increasingly becoming a bigger part of our daily lives.  In fact, Gartner research predicts that soon the average person will spend more time interacting with chatbots than with their spouse. With round-the-clock digital support becoming a critical value proposition for brands, more and more businesses are using chatbots to engage with customers to deliver the SLA expected of them. At a technical level, a chatbot (derived from “chat robot”) is a piece of code (program) that simulates human interaction through text or voice communication. Today, chatbots can be customised and used in multiple ways such as: Chatbots that interact through smart speakers Chatbots deployed on smart home devices Chatbots that can be deployed on popular messaging platforms and web In addition to having a conversation with a service agent, customers can now interact with an intelligent software that helps them to find answers fast. Whether through text or voice, chatbots can communicate with customers and respond to requests faster. To put it simply, Chatbots are Artificial Intelligence (AI) powered digital assistants that answer common customer questions. They help customers quickly resolve simple and routine issues freeing up agent time to work on more complex issues that require human interactions. How does one create customer service chatbots Customer service chatbots resolve simple, repetitive tasks that don’t require interacting with a human customer service agent. For instance, if a customer wants to know how to reset a password or the estimated delivery time for a product they ordered, a customer service chatbot quickly accesses the relevant information and answers the question without keeping the customer waiting at the other end. And while this is happening, your service agents can focus on resolving more complex customer issues and build stronger customer relationships. If you are looking to invest in chatbot technology, your first goal is to establish the most common customer requests to identify what to automate. We suggest the following six tips that you should keep in mind when designing your first AI-powered chatbot: 1. Personalise every greeting Customer service agents are trained to be warm, greet customers by name, and recognise their service privilege status. A chatbot can do the same thing in the background, powered by AI. Chatbots can be programmed to retrieve their name to ensure chatbots greet them like a human agent would. 2. Move from static to conversational Customers hate the idea of filling out an online form and then having to wait for 12 -24 hours for a response. An AI powered service chatbot can dynamically ask a series of relevant questions based on customer inputs and make the interaction more engaging. It also helps resolve the customer issues faster. And in the case where agent intervention is necessary, they will already have all the relevant information logged by the chatbot available in their panel. 3. Create interactive FAQs Traditionally, customers are prompted to visit the FAQ section of a website or app to resolve issues in a self-service mode. Chatbots turn this process around its head. They bring the FAQ answers to customers. You can stack your common FAQs and their answers into your AI interface, including all related questions and their answers.  And with natural language processing (NLP) capability built into the AI engine, chatbots recognise everyday use language and respond to customer queries. Now your customers can find what they are looking for faster than before. 4. Deploy chatbots to additional channels Businesses today deploy customer service across multiple digital channels such as web, messaging, and social allowing customers to connect with your brand in the way they want.  Salesforce research indicates that an average customer today uses nine different channels to interact with brands. This variety of options creates multiple opportunities to deliver 360-degree customer service to meet their ever-changing behaviour. You can dive deeper into your analytics to identify the channel that gets the maximum traffic for your brand, and then identify the top customer service requests on that channel. Automate your chatbot to respond to these requests and save time for your agents. 5. Engage customers with formatted text and content Basic text is all right for answering simple questions, but professionally formatted text using a range of font styles, sizes and colors enhances the customer experience. You can even insert images and interactive menus into the chat. And because it is powered by AI, your chatbot can surface a product menu, a list of articles, or customer support options, based on wat the customer asked, all within the chat. 6. Embed process automation in chatbots With AI, you can empower customers to self-serve themselves by assisting them with guided, step-by-step instruction right within the chat console. Work with your teams to identify tasks that are easy for customers to complete on their own. Therese are typically tasks that can be easily automated without needing any human intervention like renewing an insurance policy. Once your team has identified these simple and common use tasks, you can program your chatbot to guide customers throughout the service journey. And for more complex issues, when the chatbot has to hand over the conversation to an agent, the agent is already empowered with all relevant information about the case so they can resolve it quickly. Scale customer service with chatbots Your customers will recognize the value your customer service chatbots bring to them with quick, efficient resolutions to their requests and concerns. And you agents will have more tie to focus on complex customer service requests instead of answering FAQs. With AI powered chatbots, you can easily scale support to handle any case overload as and when they come your way. AI-powered chatbot technology holds the promise to reinvent the customer experience. And high-performing service teams are leading the AI powered chatbot revolution to augment their existing human customer support teams. In today’s digital first context, where speed of service is king, chatbots are helping companies stay ahead of the curve. As a Gold Salesforce Consultant, Girikon can help you deploy AI powered chatbot based customer service at scale. Contact one of our experts to learn more.