Salesforce.com For Dummies®

Salesforce.com For Dummies®

by Tom Wong, Liz Kao
Released December 2006
Publisher(s): Wiley
ISBN: 9780470048931

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Book description

So you have something to sell or you work for a business using salesforce.com, but you’re not quite sure how to maximize your profits with it? Never fear!

Salesforce.com for Dummies

shows you the quick-and-easy way to start selling your product or service online without the confusion or fuss.

With an emphasis on customer relationship management, this hands-on guide helps you manage accounts, market your products, and improve service. Whether you’re a salesperson, channel manager, marketing mogul, customer rep, or executive, you’ll find secrets here for making your job easier, your day more productive, and your business more successful. This second edition has been revised to include Salesforce.com’s latest product and feature offerings as of the Summer 2006 release, giving you the tools you need to:

  • Build a product catalog

  • Manage price books

  • Calculating and customizing forecasts

  • Drive demand up with campaigns

  • Stimulate sales effectiveness with documents

  • Deliver excellent service

  • Analyze data with reports

  • Verify your company profile

  • Add users to salesforce

  • Customize your page and search layout

  • Extend your usage of Salesforce beyond CRM

    • This guide makes suggestions on how to dive more productivity and improve communication with standard templates from the Dummies Web site. With this book you’ll get up to speed fast and manage your business information more effectively with Salesforce.com today!

    Table of contents

    1. Copyright
    2. About the Authors
    3. Dedication
    4. Authors' Acknowledgments
    5. Introduction
      1. Updates to the Second Edition
      2. How to Use This Book
      3. Foolish Assumptions
      4. Icons Used in This Book
    6. I. Salesforce Basics
      1. In this part . . .
      2. 1. Looking Over Salesforce
        1. Using Salesforce to Solve Critical Business Challenges
          1. Understanding your customer
          2. Centralizing contacts under one roof
          3. Expanding the funnel
          4. Consolidating your pipeline
          5. Working as a team
          6. Collaborating with your partners
          7. Beating the competition
          8. Improving customer service
          9. Accessing anytime, anywhere
          10. Measuring the business
        2. Extending the Value Chain
          1. Synchronizing with Outlook
          2. Integrating with your Web site
          3. Connecting to other Web sites
          4. Integrating with other applications
          5. Managing other business processes
        3. Deciding Which Edition Is Best for You
      3. 2. Navigating Salesforce
        1. Getting Familiar with Basic Terms
        2. Accessing Salesforce
          1. Setting up a password
          2. Logging in
        3. Navigating the Home Page
          1. Managing your calendar
          2. Tracking your tasks
          3. Using dashboard snapshots from the home page
          4. Accessing information with the sidebar
            1. Finding items with Search
            2. Creating new records
            3. Revisiting recent items
            4. Getting more out of your home page sidebar
        4. Navigating the Apps
          1. Discovering the AppExchange app menu
          2. Finding out about the tabs
          3. Discovering a tab home page
            1. Using the Views menu
            2. Building a custom view
            3. Reviewing the Recent Items section
            4. Reviewing common reports
            5. Tooling through the Tools section
        5. Using the Create New Drop‐down List
          1. Creating records
          2. Resurrecting from the Recycle Bin
        6. Detailing the Record
          1. Using links and buttons on the detail page
          2. Using custom links
          3. Capitalizing on related lists
        7. Getting Help and Setting Up
      4. 3. Personalizing Your System
        1. Using the Personal Setup Menu
        2. Modifying Your Personal Information
          1. Updating your user information
          2. Creating personal groups
          3. Sharing your calendar
        3. Changing Your Display
          1. Modifying your tabs
          2. Customizing pages
          3. Granting login access
        4. Optimizing Your E‐Mail
        5. Working with Salesforce Remotely
          1. Synchronizing with Outlook
            1. Installing and configuring Outlook Edition
            2. Backing up your data
          2. Synchronizing with Lotus Notes
            1. Installing and configuring Lotus Notes Edition
          3. Working Offline
            1. Installing Offline Edition
            2. Setting up the Offline Edition Briefcase
            3. Running Offline Edition
          4. Going wireless with AppExchange Mobile
        6. Importing Your Contacts
    7. II. Driving Sales — The Basics
      1. In this part . . .
      2. 4. Prospecting Leads
        1. Introducing the Lead Record
        2. Setting Up Your Leads
          1. Adding new leads
          2. Cloning an existing lead
          3. Importing your leads
          4. Sharing your leads
        3. Organizing Your Leads
          1. Using lead views
          2. Creating custom lead views
          3. Accepting leads from a queue
        4. Following Up on Leads
          1. Finding and merging duplicate lead records
          2. Tracking leads with related lists
          3. Updating lead fields
          4. Converting qualified leads
        5. Maintaining Your Lead Database
          1. Making use of lead queues
          2. Creating assignment rules for automatic routing
          3. Transferring leads
          4. Changing the status of multiple records
          5. Mass deleting lead records
      3. 5. Managing Accounts
        1. Getting Familiar with the Account Record
          1. Understanding standard fields
          2. Customizing account fields
        2. Creating and Updating Your Accounts
          1. Adding new accounts
          2. Updating account fields
          3. Sharing accounts with others
        3. Organizing Your Accounts
          1. Using account views
          2. Creating custom account views
          3. Making use of the Recent Accounts section
          4. Reassigning account ownership
            1. Reassigning a single account
            2. Reassigning multiple accounts at once
          5. Building parent/child relationships
        4. Performing Actions with Account Related Lists
          1. Defining contact roles
          2. Establishing account teams
          3. Displaying an account's opportunities
          4. Viewing cases
        5. Maintaining Your Account Database
          1. Merging duplicate records
          2. Deleting account records
      4. 6. Developing Contacts
        1. Understanding the Contact Record
        2. Customizing Contact Information
        3. Entering and Updating Your Contacts
          1. Entering new contacts
          2. Importing your contacts and accounts
          3. Updating contact fields
          4. Cloning an existing contact
        4. Organizing Your Contacts
          1. Using contact views
          2. Creating custom contact views
        5. Using the Recent Contacts Section
          1. Reassigning contact ownership
          2. Developing organizational charts
        6. Performing Actions with Contact Related Lists
        7. Merging Duplicate Records
      5. 7. Managing Activities
        1. Looking Over Activities
        2. Creating Activities
          1. Creating an event
          2. Creating a task
          3. Logging a call
        3. Organizing and Viewing Activities
          1. Viewing activities from a record's related lists
          2. Looking at your home page planner
          3. Viewing group calendars with Multi User View
          4. Looking at other users' calendars from the home page
          5. Sharing your calendar
        4. Updating Activities
          1. Assigning activities
          2. Completing a task
        5. Synchronizing with Microsoft Outlook
        6. Synchronizing with Lotus Notes
      6. 8. Sending E‐Mail
        1. Understanding E‐Mail Fields in Salesforce
        2. Setting Up Your E‐Mail
          1. Personalizing your e‐mail settings
          2. Building personal e‐mail templates
        3. Sending E‐Mail from Salesforce
          1. Creating and sending e‐mail
          2. Using e‐mail templates
          3. Attaching files to e‐mails
        4. Sending Mass E‐Mail
        5. Tracking E‐Mail
          1. Viewing e‐mails in Activity History
          2. Tracking HTML e‐mails
        6. Integrating with Outlook E‐Mail and Lotus Notes
          1. Moving sent or received Outlook e‐mail
          2. Sending outbound e‐mail from Outlook
          3. Synchronizing with Lotus Notes
      7. 9. Tracking Opportunities
        1. Getting Familiar with the Opportunity Record
        2. Entering Opportunities
          1. Adding new opportunities
          2. Cloning an opportunity
        3. Modifying Opportunity Records
          1. Updating opportunity fields
          2. Sharing opportunities with others
          3. Reassigning opportunity ownership
        4. Organizing Your Opportunities
          1. Using opportunity views
          2. Creating custom opportunity views
        5. Performing Actions with Opportunity Related Lists
          1. Defining contact roles
          2. Establishing sales teams
          3. Tracking competitors
    8. III. Driving Sales — The Next Level
      1. In this part . . .
      2. 10. Tracking Products and Price Books
        1. Discovering Products and Price Books
          1. Defining standard product fields
          2. Understanding the different types of pricing
        2. Using Products and Price Books
          1. Adding products to opportunities
          2. Updating product details for an opportunity
          3. Adding and updating schedules on opportunities
          4. Searching for products
          5. Creating custom views for products and price lists
        3. Building the Product Catalog
          1. Planning products for success
          2. Adding products to the product catalog
          3. Changing product details in the product catalog
        4. Setting Up Schedules
          1. Enabling schedules for your company
          2. Adding and updating a default schedule
        5. Managing Price Books
          1. Adding to the standard price book
            1. Adding standard prices while creating products
            2. Adding or editing standard prices for existing products
          2. Creating a custom price book
          3. Adding products to a custom price book
          4. Making global changes to price books
            1. Changing activation on price books
            2. Cloning price books
            3. Deleting price books
      3. 11. Calculating Forecasts
        1. Getting Familiar with Forecasts
        2. Updating Forecasts
          1. Viewing your forecasts
          2. Editing forecasts and applying overrides
            1. Updating opportunities on the forecast
            2. Overriding your individual forecast totals
            3. Overriding forecasts at the management level
          3. Submitting your forecast
            1. Submitting forecasts individually
            2. Submitting forecasts in batch
        3. Setting Up Customizable Forecasts
          1. Updating standard fiscal year settings
          2. Modifying the forecast settings
          3. Adjusting the forecast role hierarchy
          4. Activating Customizable Forecasts
          5. Assigning Quotas to Forecasts
            1. Setting your personal quota
            2. Editing a user's quotas
      4. 12. Managing Your Partners
        1. Understanding the Partner Lifecycle
          1. Understanding a day in the life of a channel manager
          2. Understanding a day in the life of a partner
        2. Managing Partners with Salesforce PRM
          1. Creating partner accounts and contacts
          2. Assigning leads to partners
          3. Recruiting partners
        3. Accessing Salesforce PRM as a Partner
          1. Understanding your PRM Portal home page
            1. Verifying your account information
            2. Contacting your channel manager
            3. Creating new records
            4. Browsing the lead inbox
          2. Viewing and updating your leads
          3. Managing your opportunities
        4. Setting Up Salesforce PRM for your Channel Team
          1. Granting partners access to Salesforce PRM
          2. Customizing the PRM Portal
            1. Creating a new portal
            2. Assigning partner users to a PRM portal
    9. IV. Optimizing Marketing
      1. In this part . . .
      2. 13. Driving Demand with Campaigns
        1. Understanding Campaigns
          1. Creating a new campaign
          2. Modifying the member status
        2. Building Target Lists
          1. Using rented lists
          2. Importing new campaign members
          3. Targeting existing members with the Integrated Campaign Builder
            1. Adding members from a campaign record
            2. Adding members from a custom report
            3. Adding members from a view
        3. Executing Campaigns
          1. Delivering an online campaign
          2. Executing an offline campaign
        4. Tracking Responses
          1. Capturing leads from Web forms
          2. Generating HTML
          3. Viewing and testing the form
          4. Manually updating member statuses
            1. Adding a member to a campaign
            2. Updating the status of a current member
          5. Mass updating campaign statuses
            1. Mass updating all member statuses in a campaign
            2. Mass updating all member statuses in a report
      3. 14. Driving Sales Effectiveness with Documents
        1. Understanding the Document Library
        2. Organizing Your Documents
          1. Building folders
          2. Viewing document lists
        3. Adding Documents
          1. Uploading a document
          2. Linking to an external file
        4. Using Documents
          1. Searching for documents
          2. Searching through folders
          3. Sending documents by e‐mail
        5. Maintaining the Document Library
          1. Editing document records
          2. Updating documents
          3. Deleting documents
    10. V. Delivering Excellent Service
      1. In this part . . .
      2. 15. Understanding Salesforce Service & Support
        1. Walking through a Day in the Life of a Sales Rep
        2. Understanding the Case Record
        3. Creating a Case
          1. Validating the contact
          2. Entering new cases
        4. Managing Cases
          1. Updating case fields
          2. Reassigning case ownership
          3. Getting a clue on views and queues
          4. Creating custom case views
        5. Researching and Resolving Cases
          1. Understanding solutions
          2. Finding solutions
          3. Attaching solutions to a case
        6. Communicating the Solution
          1. Responding with standard e‐mail templates
          2. Working with Email‐to‐Case
          3. Closing a case
      3. 16. Preparing Salesforce Service & Support
        1. Preparing Your Salesforce Service & Support Strategy
        2. Automating Case Management
          1. Adding case queues
          2. Using assignment rules for routing
          3. Automating case escalation
        3. Building the Knowledge Base
          1. Defining the review process
          2. Defining categories
          3. Customizing solutions
          4. Writing solutions
          5. Reviewing solutions
          6. Publishing your knowledge base
        4. Capturing and Associating Cases Efficiently
        5. Helping Customers Help Themselves
          1. Launching a self‐service portal
          2. Managing self‐service users
        6. Improving Team Productivity
          1. Using the agent console
          2. Managing service entitlements
          3. Verifying contracts
          4. Tracking assets
    11. VI. Measuring the Overall Business Performance
      1. In this part . . .
      2. 17. Analyzing Data with Reports
        1. Discovering Reports
          1. Navigating the Reports home page
          2. Displaying a report
        2. Developing Reports with the Wizard
          1. Building a report from scratch
          2. Customizing existing reports
          3. Building custom summary formulas
          4. Adding conditional highlighting
        3. Filtering on a Report
          1. Using the Org Drill Down feature
          2. Using the Report Options section
          3. Hiding and showing details
          4. Filtering with the drill down menu
          5. Clearing filters
        4. Exporting Reports to Excel
        5. Organizing Your Reports
          1. Creating new folders
          2. Reordering multiple folders
          3. Maintaining your report library
      3. 18. Seeing the Big Picture with Dashboards
        1. Figuring Out Dashboards
          1. Breaking down basic elements
          2. Planning useful dashboards
        2. Building Dashboards
          1. Generating a sample dashboard
          2. Cloning a dashboard
          3. Developing a dashboard from scratch
        3. Updating Dashboards
          1. Editing dashboard properties
          2. Editing a component
          3. Modifying the layout
          4. Refreshing the dashboard
        4. Organizing Your Dashboards
          1. Viewing dashboard lists
          2. Building dashboard folders
      4. 19. Fine‐Tuning the Configuration
        1. Figuring Out Configuration
          1. Breaking down basic elements
          2. Planning configuration to achieve success
        2. Verifying Your Company Profile
          1. Updating your company information
          2. Defining fiscal years
        3. Defining the Role Hierarchy
        4. Defining Your Sharing Model
          1. Setting organization‐wide defaults
          2. Creating groups
          3. Granting greater access with sharing rules
        5. Setting Up Profiles
          1. Reviewing the standard profiles
          2. Creating custom profiles
        6. Adding Users to Salesforce
        7. Using Other Security Controls
          1. Setting field‐level security
          2. Delegating administration
    12. VII. Designing the Salesforce Solution
      1. In this part . . .
      2. 20. Customizing Salesforce
        1. Discovering Customization
          1. Breaking down basic elements
          2. Customizing for relevance
        2. Building and Editing Fields
          1. Adding fields
          2. Viewing and updating fields
          3. Replicating your key standard processes
          4. Understanding custom formula fields
        3. Using Custom Buttons and Links
        4. Customizing Page and Search Layouts
          1. Modifying a page layout
          2. Assigning layouts to profiles
          3. Changing search layouts
        5. Managing Multiple Business Processes
        6. Managing Record Types
        7. Creating Dependent Picklists
        8. Managing Workflow & Approvals
          1. Creating workflow rules
          2. Assigning workflow tasks
          3. Using workflow alerts
      3. 21. Extending Salesforce Beyond CRM
        1. Understanding the AppExchange Platform
        2. Preparing Your AppExchange Strategy
        3. Creating Custom Apps with AppExchange Builder
          1. Setting Up the Custom App
          2. Building Your Custom Objects
          3. Modifying custom objects
            1. Building relationships
            2. Creating fields
            3. Adding custom links
            4. Changing layouts
            5. Customizing related lists
          4. Creating Custom Tabs
            1. Adding a tab to a custom object
            2. Building a Web tab
        4. Sharing Apps on the AppExchange Directory
          1. Browsing the AppExchange directory
          2. Trying out the AppExchange directory
          3. Installing AppExchange apps
        5. Deploying AppExchange Apps for Your Organization
          1. Testing your AppExchange apps
          2. Running through typical scenarios
          3. Deploying the solution
      4. 22. Migrating and Maintaining Your Data
        1. Understanding Your Options for Data Migration
          1. Using import wizards
          2. Investigating AppExchange Data Loader
        2. Migrating Your Legacy Data
          1. Determining your data sources
          2. Preparing your data
          3. Testing the import
          4. Analyzing the test data results
          5. Migrating your final data
          6. Validating your data
          7. Augmenting your data
        3. Managing Your Salesforce Database
          1. Backing up your data
          2. Mass transferring records
          3. Mass updating addresses
          4. Mass deleting records
        4. Getting Help with Complex Data Tasks
    13. VIII. The Part of Tens
      1. In this part . . .
      2. 23. Ten Ways to Drive More Productivity
        1. Finding the Top Five Resources
        2. Revisiting Five Great Productivity Tools
      3. 24. Ten Keys to a Successful Implementation
        1. Identifying Your Executive Sponsor
        2. Building Your Project Team
        3. Evaluating Your Processes
        4. Gathering Requirements
        5. Defining Your Scope and Prioritizing Initiatives
        6. Modeling Salesforce to Your Business
        7. Customizing for User Relevance
        8. Importing Clean Data
        9. Building a Comprehensive Training Plan
        10. Connecting with Peers
      4. Improving Communication with Standard Templates
        1. Understanding Standard Templates
        2. Planning Your E‐Mail Templates
          1. Understanding the possibilities
          2. Setting up e‐mail template folders
        3. Creating E‐Mail Templates
          1. Creating a text e‐mail template
          2. Generating merge fields for e‐mail
          3. Creating a standard HTML letterhead
          4. Creating an HTML template with a letterhead
          5. Creating a custom HTML template
        4. Setting Up Your Mail Merge Templates
          1. Uploading your mail merge templates
        5. Running a Mail Merge

    Product information

    • Title: Salesforce.com For Dummies®
    • Author(s): Tom Wong, Liz Kao
    • Release date: December 2006
    • Publisher(s): Wiley
    • ISBN: 9780470048931