Covid-19 Crisis: Support your Remote Workforce with Salesforce.com

Operating a business during the COVID-19 pandemic requires flexibility and innovation. The cloud-based application is an absolute must for supporting employees in their “new office”, the home office. Salesforce has provided cloud-based technology that supports both office-based, and remote workforces for over twenty years.

Conrin’s CRM custom app, built on the Salesforce.com platform, was developed to support the unique requirements faced by economic developers. Features were designed to capture and manage key metrics associated with EDO-specific requirements. Preconfigured functionality supports critical workflows such as:

• Project management
• Business Retention
• Attraction activities
• Workforce management.

For decades, economic development teams have worked in structured office environments. Because of this, it has been relatively easy to ignore Salesforce.com functionality developed to support remote employees. If a question came up, one could simply walk over to someone and ask a coworker. Spreadsheets could be shared and stored on company share drives. With recent shelter-in-place regulations, implemented to fight COVID-19, now is the time to reconsider the benefits found in previously unused Salesforce.com features.

Chatter provides a secure platform to use the power of the “private social media” platform native to Salesforce.com. Chatter eliminates endless email threads, enables file sharing, and custom groups for project management.

Salesforce Files delivers the ability to share project-specific documents, marketing collateral, and graphics. Built-in document version controls eliminate email searches for spreadsheets and other files to locate the most recent copy. Security protocols ensure that confidential files are granted access to only those with management approval.

Dashboards and Reports deliver real-time ability to view key metrics, activities, and project stages. Dashboards are easily created via drag and drop interface. Reports are accessible directly within Salesforce.com.   Email delivery notification includes links to dashboards and reports at predetermined times. Finally, employees no longer need to spend time creating reports using Excel or Word documents.

These features are just a few of those available in all Salesforce subscriptions, no additional expenses or license fees required. Take advantage of Conrin’s “feature utilization” audit. The audit is free and includes a report of unused assets already available in Salesforce.com.

For professional consultation on the merits of EDO CRM applications, please contact Todd Smithee @ Conrin. Inc. or call him directly at 616-340-4519.