Salesforce powers modern business, with over 150,000 companies trusting it as their enterprise CRM. Its rich ecosystem of features and apps helps organizations capture and manage vast amounts of valuable data. However, when companies grow, have more complex reporting needs, or need to blend data that doesn’t live in Salesforce, they often find themselves seeking additional ways to analyze and work with their data.
This guide cuts through the noise of countless reporting solutions to help you determine the right tool for you, depending on your needs. We’ll also explore why spreadsheets are often the go-to choice for many business professionals and how to make them work seamlessly with your Salesforce instance.
What Happens When You Need Answers Now?
You spot something interesting in your Salesforce data. You want to dig in, but you need to compare it against your marketing campaign data from HubSpot to tell the full story. Or, maybe you need a specialized visualization that isn’t available in the standard options.
You considered requesting your data team, but the last time you did, it took weeks to hear back. They’re swamped – and this isn’t exactly “high-priority”, it’ll never get to the front of their queue.
You decide to take matters into your own hands and head to the AppExchange, where you’re hit with almost 400 Salesforce reporting and visualization tools.
The fallacy of choice. Or, at least you’d think so. Except, none are quite right for your use case.
You need something that can:
- Pull live data from Salesforce and other sources
- Allow for quick ad-hoc analysis
- Enable you to push updates back to Salesforce
Good news: you have options. This guide will help you understand the different types of solutions available and choose the one that best fits your needs.
Understanding Your Salesforce Reporting Options
Despite Salesforce’s power as a system of record, it’s sometimes not as flexible as we need for our analysis. Here are some specific challenges users face:
- Report builders are set with pre-configured report types and fields, making accessing and combining data across objects difficult.
- Visualization options include eight basic chart types and features like reference lines remain static instead of adjusting dynamically with filters.
- Historical trend analysis requires many steps, especially when teams need to track changes in forecasts or compare data across different time periods.
This explains the robust ecosystem of point solutions available on AppExchange. Without these apps, teams end up relying on administrators or data teams for routine tasks and analyses. Let’s look at the main types of solutions available and what they’re best suited for:
Enterprise BI Platforms (Such As Tableau)
These platforms shine in organizations with complex data visualization needs and dedicated data teams. They excel at large-scale reporting across multiple departments and offer advanced analytics capabilities for sophisticated forecasting and trend analysis.
However, they often require technical expertise and ongoing support from your data team, which means you could still face delays when you need quick answers to business questions.
Point Solutions from AppExchange
When you have specific reporting challenges like territory management or quota tracking, these specialized tools can be exactly what you need. They come with pre-built dashboards for common use cases and typically deploy quickly. Many teams find success with these solutions when they need standard reports right away.
The main consideration is that while they solve specific problems well, they might become limiting when you need to combine data from multiple sources or create custom analyses.
Spreadsheets: The Universal Analysis Tool
Take a second and look around your desktop. You probably have two or three spreadsheets open in separate tabs or windows right now. We all do – and there’s a good reason for that.
Spreadsheets strike the perfect balance of power and accessibility. They’re where most business professionals already work, offering familiar features like pivot tables, formulas, and customizable charts. When combined with the right API connector, they become even more powerful – letting you blend data from multiple sources, run quick analyses, and share insights with your team.
This explains why many teams turn to spreadsheet solutions like XL-Connector and G-Connector. However, not all connectors are created equal.
What Makes a Great Spreadsheet Solution
When choosing a spreadsheet connector for Salesforce, three capabilities matter most:
- You need to bring multiple data sources together. Your sales data becomes more valuable when you can compare it with marketing metrics, support tickets, and financial data – all in one place.
- Setup and daily use should be straightforward. You want answers now, not after a complex implementation process or lengthy training sessions.
- Your data needs to stay fresh. When you update information in your spreadsheet (like those carefully calculated lead scores), those changes should reflect in Salesforce automatically.
How Coefficient Helps
Coefficient is a spreadsheet connector that brings these capabilities together in Excel and Google Sheets. Here’s what sets it apart:
- Multi-Source Integration: Automatically import and export data across any source, not just Salesforce. Blend your CRM data with marketing analytics, financial data, and more for a holistic view of your business.
- Powerful Automation: Set up scheduled refreshes and Slack or email alerts to keep your Salesforce reporting up-to-date and stakeholders informed.
- No-Code Interface: Easy to use, with premium support when you need it. Empower your teams to work directly with their data and move faster.
Think Coefficient might be a fit? Try Coefficient from the AppExchange and see for yourself why we stand out from the other 379 Salesforce reporting tools. Or, skip the middleman and download Coefficient for Google Sheets or Excel now!
Summary
As Salesforce continues to evolve, so too must our approach to analyzing and using business data.
The right solution depends on your specific needs. Enterprise BI tools make sense when you need sophisticated visualizations and have dedicated data teams to support them, point solutions from AppExchange work well for specialized reporting challenges, and spreadsheet connectors like Coefficient bridge the gap when you need flexibility and speed.
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