Over the past ten years or so, Salesforce has grown from a company that provided a robust enterprise CRM platform, to a large number of different clouds that can support any business team. The Salesforce platform, or “Customer 360” as it’s often called, allows companies to connect different parts of their business to Salesforce, providing that full 360-degree view of the customer. To enable us to connect the new products they have acquired (such as Marketing Cloud, Tableau, and Slack), Salesforce provides multiple, easy-to-use connectors to seamlessly integrate each system. In this blog post, I will walk through the five main connectors, all of which allow organizations to maximize their digital transformations.
What Is a Connector?
A connector is a way to allow two or more standalone systems to communicate with each other – be it sending or receiving data, or triggering certain processes in one or both.
As you can see from the diagram below, the Salesforce core platform has multiple products, including Sales and Service Cloud. Other services are built outside the Salesforce platform, and therefore require a bi-directional connector to allow data to sync.
Let’s dive into these connectors to show the full breadth of their functionality.
1. Slack Connector
With Slack now part of the Salesforce family, it’s important to ensure that the core Salesforce platform and Slack had a tight integration.
A little thing like being able to search and reference Salesforce records while sharing a message on a channel is sure to have a positive impact on cross-team collaboration – especially when it comes to large Accounts or complex Opportunities.
Using the Slack connector, not only can the most up-to-date Salesforce info be shared through instant messaging, but you can also ensure your users receive timely alerts without even going into Salesforce.
As an added bonus (from an end user’s point of view), this two-minute video should be everything you need to try it out themselves!
When it comes to connecting the two, it’s close to being a ‘walk in the park’ in terms of ease. The principle is far less simple compared to other more “architectural” integrations. There is a managed package to install in Salesforce and an app installed in Slack.
Note: If you are using the Salesforce legacy app in Slack, it is recommended for you to migrate to the latest version above, and also explore the new suite of Salesforce for Slack integrations which is now available for individual products and use cases.
2. & 3. Marketing Cloud and Pardot Connectors
As two of the most efficient tools for marketers around the world, Marketing Cloud and Pardot can be leveraged to build complex processes related to your customers or prospects.
While they’re great by themselves, wouldn’t it be better if these could be driven by data within your Salesforce org? This is exactly what Marketing Cloud Connect and the Pardot Connector are for.
Marketing Cloud Connect
Available as a managed package to be installed in your Salesforce org, Marketing Cloud Connect ensures that your marketing team has the best of both worlds: the digital marketing capabilities of Marketing Cloud, with a flavor of their Salesforce Campaigns and data.
Marketing Cloud Connector is currently unavailable in the Lightning interface. So, if you attempt to open it in Lightning, you will be redirected to Classic. Despite the lack of Lightning interface for the connector, Salesforce has gone above and beyond in covering absolutely every step of your journey when it comes to this integration; Salesforce walks you through everything you need, from prerequisite checklists to testing if the connection is working as intended.
Salesforce Pardot Connector
The Pardot connector makes it possible to send Salesforce data into Pardot through APIs, with the sync between the systems happening every 2-4 minutes. Since the sharing model between the two is quite different, it’s essential to understand what data can be synced when connecting them.
Opportunities, Accounts, and even Person Accounts (just to name a few) can be visualized in Pardot, ensuring that key data can be accessed in an instant. Make sure you check all the considerations and features highlighted (in detail) in the documentation.
How you set this up depends solely on how your users need to leverage the integration, but it all starts with a connector user with the right Salesforce permissions. For example, you can easily connect Pardot with Salesforce Campaigns by enabling the Connected Campaigns functionality within Pardot Settings, which offers you the ability to easily keep track of the marketing team’s efforts.
4. Tableau Connector
Salesforce and Tableau have been partnered for a long time now – much longer than the actual acquisition. While there has always been a way to connect the two, this integration is expected to become more powerful and seamless with every new release.
While the Salesforce Connector can be leveraged from both Tableau Desktop and Online, there is a ‘quick win’ available for your users, which is readily available and totally free. With the only prerequisites being both a Salesforce and Tableau license, the Tableau Viz Lightning Web Component can now display the complex Tableau visualizations straight on Lightning Record Pages in Salesforce, saving users quite a few clicks in the long run.
5. MuleSoft Salesforce Connector
One of the fun parts of a Salesforce Architect’s job is integrating Salesforce with the rest of a business’s tech stack. However, it’s often not as simple as installing an app from the AppExchange. What are the options when a managed package or a dedicated connector are not feasible solutions, or perhaps not the best solution from a technical perspective?
As highlighted in this Trailhead module (which perfectly explains what a connector is), combining within the Mule Integration app (where processing logic takes place) one of the MuleSoft Salesforce Connectors and one for a third-party system, can be the key to success for the above mentioned requirement.
Check out this video to better understand how the Anypoint Platform, along with the multiple Salesforce connectors, can make your life easier.
Summary
With integrations becoming one of the most common topics in the ecosystem, finding and using the right connector can be a real time and cost saver for both Salesforce Architects and their end users. Finding the right solution can take them one step closer to the Customer 360 Experience that Salesforce and many other tech companies are striving for today.