Salesforce Admins Podcast

Today on the Salesforce Admins Podcast, we’ve got the Monthly Retro for June.

Join us as we talk about all the can’t-miss Salesforce content from June and why you should submit a presentation for the Admin Track at this year’s Dreamforce.

You should subscribe for the full episode, but here are a few takeaways from our conversation from our Monthly Retro.

Live Events

We just got back from World Tour London which was a blast, and the NYC version just wrapped. There were tons of great presentations and it was so great to see everyone in person again, so make sure you catch up on all the action.

Blog highlights from June

LeeAnne and Mike put together a great roundup about what CDP is and how it will make our lives as admins that much easier. There are a lot of fun use cases and it can help you get a handle on how CDP will turn your rich customer data into action.

Video highlights from June

Another month, another great batch of video content from Jennifer Lee. This time, she’s on the hunt for how to stop unwanted changes to reports you thought were good to go. There’s also a throwback to the old Salesforce UI for those in know.

Podcast highlights from June

“Skills pay the bills,” as they say, and we’ve spent a lot of June highlighting our new Salesforce Admin Skills Kit. We think you should listen to our episode with David Nava, where we catch up on all the amazing things he’s been doing since the last time he was on the pod in 2019 and how he helps other veterans make the transition to the ecosystem.

Dreamforce 2022 Admin Track Call for Presentations

Dreamforce is coming up soon, and submissions are officially open for Admin Track presentations, which are due by July 8th. Make sure to read through this handy blog post to label your submission correctly and, hopefully, we’ll see you soon!

 

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Full show transcript

Mike Gerholdt: Welcome to the Salesforce Admins Podcast in the June monthly retro for 2022. I'm your host Mike Gerholdt. And in this episode, we're going to review the top product, community and careers content for June. And of course, helping me do that in a bright yellow Jersey, I don't know why, is the familiar voice of Gillian Bruce. Hello, Gillian.

Gillian Bruce: Go warriors.

Mike Gerholdt: Oh, is that why it is? The basketball is over. You know what's crazy along those lines, I think I heard ESPN talk about the Stanley Cup playoffs.

Gillian Bruce: Those are also happening now. Yes.

Mike Gerholdt: Okay. So if we didn't have artificial ice, where would we have these playoffs, because it's hot everywhere. It's like a hundred or something in Iowa.

Gillian Bruce: Well, if they really wanted hockey to be seasonal, it would all be in the fall in the winter. Right?

Mike Gerholdt: As it should be, yes. We'd also be done playing basketball by now, because summer's just for messing around and going to pools and vacations.

Gillian Bruce: To be fair, everyone has been done playing basketball for about a month. It's just the Warriors who managed to win the finals, play into June.

Mike Gerholdt: I see.

Gillian Bruce: The fourth time in recent history.

Mike Gerholdt: Who did they play this year?

Gillian Bruce: Oh, we just beat Boston.

Mike Gerholdt: Boston. Okay.

Gillian Bruce: The Celtics.

Mike Gerholdt: Oh yeah.

Gillian Bruce: Bye Boston.

Mike Gerholdt: I just saw the winning time on that, where the Lakers beat Boston.

Gillian Bruce: Boston Celtics have a very rich history of winning a lot, but now the Warriors have a dynasty themselves. So there you go. There you go.

Mike Gerholdt: We just lost all our Celtic's fans.

Gillian Bruce: Oh, don't worry. Celtics fans love to hear people hate on them. This is kind of what feeds the Boston [inaudible].

Mike Gerholdt: It's a thing?

Gillian Bruce: Yeah. They thrive on the hate. So it's not even hate, it's respect. Good job Celtics. But Steph Clay, [inaudible] Andre are back. All right. Enough of that. It's not a sport's podcast. That's what my husband does.

Mike Gerholdt: Not yet anyway.

Gillian Bruce: We're going to be talking about all the great Salesforce admin content from June.

Mike Gerholdt: Yeah. But first we had people on planes traveling.

Gillian Bruce: Oh gosh, that's right. Planes, trains, and automobiles. Happening.

Mike Gerholdt: Jumping the pond, as they call it.

Gillian Bruce: Yeah. We had some of our team members over in London, not too long ago for the World Tour, which by all things appearing on the social medias looked amazing.

Mike Gerholdt: So shout out to the London admin user group. We love you guys. Thank you for hosting and having Ella and Leanne join. It's always fun presenting there. Gillian, I think all of us have presented there. It's like a right of passage, right?

Gillian Bruce: It really is. It really is. The London admin user group is ... will always hold a special place in my heart, because I feel like it was one of the first admin user groups. And it's just full of just some amazing people who are doing a lot to help each other out and their career growth. And it's just ... yeah, I think that was my first trip to London was ...

Mike Gerholdt: Could be. We did a live podcast there.

Gillian Bruce: We sure did. We sure did.

Mike Gerholdt: That was fun.

Gillian Bruce: Yeah.

Mike Gerholdt: And exciting. Jumping ahead to the tour, the pictures that Ella and Leanne ... Ella and London sent back, all of London sent pictures back to me on my Slack channel.

Gillian Bruce: Ella, Leanne, London.

Mike Gerholdt: Yeah. The theaters look really packed. So everybody really showed up. It's always fun doing stuff at the Excel Center.

Gillian Bruce: Yeah. People are clearly excited to be back in person and to connect and learn and have fun. And that's what it's all about. So it's great to get that vibe and we're just going to carry that vibe right on into the next tour, because Mike, I am literally stepping out the door to go to New York City to go to the New York World Tour.

Mike Gerholdt: Great segue.

Gillian Bruce: Great segue.

Mike Gerholdt: It's going to be awesome.

Gillian Bruce: It's going to be amazing. It's going to be great to connect with the very vibrant, all of the community groups that are in the New York area are going to be representing in full force. We are doing quite a few sessions in both the Trailblazer Theater and we've got a whole breakout session we've got together. Jennifer Lee is presenting a whole bunch, because that's what she does.

Mike Gerholdt: Right.

Gillian Bruce: So it's going to be a really great chance to see everybody and yeah, just meeting some new trailblazers, which is always fun.

Mike Gerholdt: Is there any food that you get in New York that you look forward to?

Gillian Bruce: Oh God, it's been so long since I was there.

Mike Gerholdt: I know, that's why I asked.

Gillian Bruce: I think actually the last time I was in New York was before my first born was born.

Mike Gerholdt: Oh boy.

Gillian Bruce: So I do remember there's a steak place that Damon, my husband is obsessed with called Peter Luger's, which is actually across the bridge. It's not in Manhattan and it's ... Mike, next time you and I are there together, we will go.

Mike Gerholdt: Steak. Yes. The Midwest in me wants steak.

Gillian Bruce: It's one of the most famous steakhouses in the world. So that's fun. I don't know if I'm going to hit that up, but I am going to get to go to hopefully a show on Broadway, which will be really fun.

Mike Gerholdt: Oh fun.

Gillian Bruce: So I looking forward to that.

Mike Gerholdt: Yeah. Pre-pandemic, my last trip to New York was in December and a few of us got to go see a lived tape of Stephen Colbert.

Gillian Bruce: Nice. Nice.

Mike Gerholdt: Yeah. Super fun. Oh man. That was blast. All right. So we can talk more food.

Gillian Bruce: Food. I will say of my-

Mike Gerholdt: It's the Salesforce Admins Podcast where we cover sports and food. Totally makes sense. Right?

Gillian Bruce: Yeah. I'm going to sprinkle in a little bit of trashy TV, because I also say that I have been trying to get tickets to go to a live taping of Watch What Happens Live With Andy Cohen. Needless to say, I've gotten nowhere. It's one of the hardest things to get into. But if anybody on this podcast who's listening right now has a trick of how to do that, I will specifically go back to New York to get in on that taping. So any Bravo diehards or anyone with a connection, let me know.

Mike Gerholdt: That's filmed in New York? I always saw it was filmed in LA. Andy Cohen always comes off to me as very LA.

Gillian Bruce: He's very New York.

Mike Gerholdt: Oh, interesting. I judged that one wrong.

Gillian Bruce: Yeah.

Mike Gerholdt: So top content. First thing I want to point out is the Introduction To Salesforce CDP For Admins, which Leanne wrote. I helped write, but we only get one author. So I chose Leanne. This is a fun little article to dig into. We've heard CDP. Gillian, you were in New York. CDP was everywhere in New York. I'd say as an admin, for sure, jump in.
This was really insightful for me to understand how CDP, which is customer data platform, what it means for admins, how we can do it. And really what are the actual fun cases of sitting around, talking with different parts of our organization, understanding market segmentation, owners, what the business case is for it. To me, it's a good way to really drive that next level engagement with Salesforce. So I enjoyed writing it, check it out.

Gillian Bruce: Yeah. It's a great article. Good job, Mike. I also will say listeners, stay tuned, because we have James Richter, who's going to be joining us on the podcast in a future episode to talk all about CDP for admins. And talking about what he has seen help admins be successful with CDP, how you talk about the strategy of one to implement a CDP, and how to set yourself up for success. So stay tuned. We got more CDP goodness coming your way.

Mike Gerholdt: More CDP. James Richter. Is he any relation to Andy Richter, speaking of Late Night?

Gillian Bruce: I didn't ask. I don't think so.

Mike Gerholdt: Well, there's your first question.

Gillian Bruce: We've already had this conversation, but maybe on Twitter when we release it, we can pile on announcing that.

Mike Gerholdt: "Are you related to Andy Richter." "No, I get asked that all the time though. Thanks." The next thing I wanted to point out was a video that Jennifer Lee put out. A part of The How I solved It series, Monitor Unwanted Changes To Reports. The title says it all, right?

Gillian Bruce: Who doesn't want that?

Mike Gerholdt: Oh my. Come on.

Gillian Bruce: Stop changing my reports, people.

Mike Gerholdt: It's like, it just ... so it was really good how she worked through it. I really enjoyed watching her talk with Cassie. The screenshots, walking you through everything, for those of us in the know, there's even some throwback days to the old field layout properties, where you get to see the old Salesforce interface. But man, let me tell you. The number of times that I've put reports out into the world and then a few months later come back and reran it. It's like, what did you do? How is it possible for you to have tangled up and changed things this bad? So I really appreciate this post. I'm sure admins will too.

Gillian Bruce: It's a must view. It's a must view.

Mike Gerholdt: It is. And Gillian and tee you up for the trifecta of the content that we put out in June. You did a podcast with David on transferable skills, because you're the skills person.

Gillian Bruce: Hey skills pay the bills, as they say.

Mike Gerholdt: Yep.

Gillian Bruce: Or do they say that? I don't know.

Mike Gerholdt: They do now.

Gillian Bruce: I'm just saying that. So yes. I had a fantastic conversation with David Nava, who is a repeat guest on the podcast, but he's done a lot since the first time he was on in 2019. That's when he was just starting to make his transition from the military to working in the Salesforce ecosystem. Now not only is he working in the Salesforce ecosystem, but he's on his second kind of Salesforce ecosystem company and that happens to be Salesforce.
So, and he's a now not just making his own transition from military to Salesforce, he's helping hundreds and hundreds of other people in the military community make the same transition. So really great to catch up with him, talk really about kind of how that admin skills kit can play into helping folks figure out which skills they can transfer from their previous or current industries into the Salesforce ecosystem. So give it a listen, if you haven't already. David is fantastic. So many great things. I mean, hey, who doesn't want to hear from a Naval flight officer who is-

Mike Gerholdt: Oh, seriously.

Gillian Bruce: An amazing Salesforce professional. And he's got such a passion for giving back and helping other people make similar transitions.

Mike Gerholdt: Yeah. Yeah. Very cool.

Gillian Bruce: Yeah. Must listen.

Mike Gerholdt: What I fear or what I'm happy to announce will be a new segment on the pod, that we will wrap things up with is, hey, it's just about Dreamforce time.

Gillian Bruce: It's beginning to feel a lot like Dreamforce.

Mike Gerholdt: Yeah.

Gillian Bruce: Coming back this year.

Mike Gerholdt: In person in San Francisco, where they have a winning basketball team.

Gillian Bruce: Yeah, we do. Dynasty.

Mike Gerholdt: See, I worked that in there.

Gillian Bruce: Dynasty.

Mike Gerholdt: Want to remind everybody and the link will be in the show notes, you have until July 8th to submit to the admin track call for presentations. Please take a second, read that blog post. And I mean read it, not skim it and like, "Oh cool. It's open. Here's the link." But actually read through it. There's some fields we want you to fill out, because this is open for all of Salesforce. So all of Salesforce is collecting submissions through the CFP, not just Admin developer and Architect Track and want to make sure that you label your submission correctly, so that we can adequately review it, because we have a tight little turnaround.
It's going to be Dreamforce before we know it. So if you have an idea, start sketching it down. As soon as you're done listening to the podcast, which it's almost over, I promise, maybe another block and a half to home and then we're done. But think through, submit early, don't wait till July 8th, because I promise you're going to wake up and you're going to be like, "Oh it's July 8th. Oh it closed." Or the tab died, or your internet goes out, or something. It's going to happen. Get it in early. There's no reward for being last in the door.

Gillian Bruce: Yeah. Get it in early. Make sure that you really kind of think about why this belongs at Dreamforce. Again, read the posts. It's all in there about how to put it together. What kind of content we're looking to feature at Dreamforce. So, it's a great opportunity. If you've never thought about presenting a Dreamforce, here is your opportunity. And if you're a little nervous, partner with somebody who has presented before. There are a lot of people who presented before, who would love to have a collaborator. So great opportunity to develop some content, share it and get a really cool experience.

Mike Gerholdt: Yep. I would agree. If you want to learn more about anything that we talked about on today's episode, please go to admin.salesforce.com to find those links and resources, including the one to the CFP. You can stay up to date with us on social for all things admins. We are at Salesforceadmns, no eye on Twitter. I'm on Twitter at MikeGerholdt and Gillian is at GillianKBruce. So that, stay safe, stay awesome and stay tuned for the next episode. We'll see you in the cloud.



Direct download: June_2022_Monthly_Retro_with_Mike_and_Gillian.mp3
Category:general -- posted at: 3:00am PST

Today on the Salesforce Admins Podcast, we talk to James Richter, Director, Cloud Success & CSG Global Program Lead, Salesforce Customer Data Platform (CDP). Join us as we talk about what CDP is, how it will be the single source of truth across all platforms, and how to get your org ready.

You should subscribe for the full episode, but here are a few takeaways from our conversation with James Richter.

What is CDP?

If you’ve been puzzling over CDP and what it could do for your org, you’re not alone. “My team is focused on getting CDP into the market, so you’re not the only one wondering what it is,” James says. So what is it?

“Have you ever read Dr. Seuss’s I Wish That I Had Duck Feet?” James asks. In the book, a kid wants to have duck feet to splash around and not have to keep them dry. However, he soon realizes there are some downsides to duck feet. For example, he can’t wear shoes. “What we’ve found is marketers and admins are the same way,” James says, you get all these shiny new tools but end up with a bunch of extra data you don’t know what to do with. CDP is being built to help you manage all that data so you can play with the fun stuff and not worry about wearing shoes.

The Single Source of Truth

You can do so much with all of the tools out there for the platform, but the data is really hard to deal with. CDP aims to segment and manage everything for you. For now, they’re building it to help with Marketing Cloud, but in the near future CDP will be the single source of truth across all the different Salesforce platforms for everything that a customer has done.

A lot of the stuff that CDP does is possible with tools like SQL, but CDP will make it possible with a lot less code and effort.

Getting Ready for CDP

So how do you get ready? The first thing is to make sure you have someone in the room who understands each of your systems. Before you start building, you need to understand what you’re building with. You need to know what data is the same across each platform so you can harmonize it, but that means you need someone to translate for you and explain what you’re looking at.

Once you’re able to show just how easy it is to get any piece of data you’re after with clicks, not code, the power of CDP will speak for itself. “It makes everybody’s life easier,” James says, “and that’s an easy thing to advocate for.”

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Full show transcript

Gillian Bruce: Welcome to the Salesforce Admins Podcast, where we talk about product, community, and careers, to help you be an awesome admin. I'm your host today, Gillian Bruce, and we are talking about CDP. You might be saying, "Gillian, what is CDP?" Well, don't worry, we're going to get into it, because it is a big deal, and it is an amazing thing for all admins to think about, because it really truly brings the single source of truth to your Salesforce platform. To talk about that today, we have James Richter joining us, he's a director, cloud success, and CSG global program lead at Salesforce. He is doing all things CDP with customers, so he's the right person to come on and explain what it is. Without further ado, let's get James on the pod. James, welcome to the podcast.

James Richter: Thank you so much, thanks for having me.

Gillian Bruce: It's so great to have you, and I'm very looking forward to our conversation, because we're going to talk about something that I don't know much about, and that is CDP. Before we get into all of that, can you tell us a little bit about what you do at Salesforce?

James Richter: Yeah, absolutely, so I am part of our shared success team, my team is focused on getting CDP into the market. It's new for everybody, so you're not the only one wondering what it is. We've been trying to teach people and also learn from everybody, so we're out there working with our customers and partners to get CDP stood up in their environments, and just learn alongside them, and also, teach them as we go, and share that knowledge across to everybody else.

Gillian Bruce: All right, I like it. Okay, so here you are on the podcast, you got a whole audience of admins to talk to about CDP. Let's get right into it, what is CDP? What does it stand for?

James Richter: What a great question. Yeah, so CDP is a customer data platform, and I think if you go out in Google, you will find a lot of answers as to what a CDP is. I'll give you my take on it, and then we can talk later about how that checks out with your understanding. I don't know, you've you've got kids, have you ever read Dr. Seuss' I Wish That I Had Duck Feet?

Gillian Bruce: Okay, my kids are a little too young for that yet, but I do remember that book, yes. This is the greatest leading off explanation I think we've ever had on the pod, so please, take me from Dr. Seuss to CDP?

James Richter: Yeah, so Dr. Seuss, there's a kid that says, "I Wish that I had duck feet, I can tell you why, I can splash around, I don't have to keep them dry." But then he realizes like, "Hey, if I had duck feet, I couldn't have any shoes," and he says, "I wish I had an elephant nose, so I could put out fires. He's like, "But then they'd make me wash the windows." What we've found is marketers and admins, we're the same way, we see all these cool, shiny tools and we're like, "Hey, I want to go out and get that," and we get it.
We realize like, "Hey, we had a consequence to that, the consequence is usually I got a bunch of data. I've got a bunch of different records of people, I've got all this data out there." What we've tried to do with CDP is say, "Hey, bring us all that data. Let's let you have all the cool things, and let's be the platform where you can bring the data ,and hopefully we can give it to you in a way that you can use it. You can have all the fun with it, and not have to suffer the consequence," that's the goal.

Gillian Bruce: I love this. Okay, data is like admin love language kind of. Let's dig into a little bit... CDP is not unique to Salesforce, and so tell us a little bit about why now Salesforce is in the CDP space? What does that look like?

James Richter: Yeah, so I obviously we have been in the data space for a very long time, and everybody has come to this conclusion at the same time that we've got to have a way to start leveraging all these systems. We've got all these great companies out there that are offering so many great tools, but as admins, you get overwhelmed by them. We saw the writing on the wall that we were going to have to have something that would allow people to take full advantage of them, and so I think that's why we've landed here.

Gillian Bruce: Okay, so you mentioned we have a lot of tools, which is very true. Admins are at the crux of all of the tools, and especially the last few years. It's not just what we used to think of as core Salesforce tools, but now we've got MuleSoft, we've got Slack, we've got Tableau, how does CDP sit in the context of this expanded one Salesforce platform?

James Richter: Yeah, so right now, a lot of the use cases that we're talking about are for marketers. We look at marketing cloud as our primary recipient of the data at the moment, and so you're in CDP, you're running these segments, you're building these audiences, you're finding all the different versions of Gillian. You're saying, "Hey, tell me all the things she's done across all these different tools that I have?" Then I want to be able to send her a message that's the right message for her. At the moment, we're seeing it sit within our core platform, that's where we're doing all the segmentation. That's where we're bringing all the data, we're storing the data, we're doing the segmentation. Then we're sending that over to marketing cloud for action via email, via SMS, whatever it may be.
Long-term though, what we're saying is we want to bring those segments back into core, we want to bring them into CRM and say, "Hey, when somebody calls our call center, I want to be able to look Gillian up, I want to be able to see all the times I've known Gillian, I want to see what's local to this system that I'm in, what's local to this CRM that I'm in. Then let's also pull in all our other ones." We're multi-tenant we want to be able to bring all those back in and say, "I know what you have done on each one of these platforms, and that makes me better able to help you, and better able to serve your needs."

Gillian Bruce: We're talking about a real true single source of truth for a customer within the context of all of the systems, which is pretty exciting.

James Richter: It's awesome. Yeah, it's finding the harmonization across all those different records and saying you can finally reference all of them. You can finally look at all these instances of the customers, all the things we've been talking about, and that's the goal, that's the dream, and that's the need that the market has, and so that's what we're after.

Gillian Bruce: I mean, I'm already just building dashboards in my head of all of the incredible things that you could now display, thinking of how you can connect all of those interactions into one beautiful thing that we can look at. That's a really descriptive word, but so what are some of the... You mentioned you've got some use cases, can you talk to us a little bit more about maybe one or two examples of initial CDP use cases, that maybe some customers are working on right now?

James Richter: Sure, a lot of them aren't new, a lot of these are use cases that we've talked about forever. It's I want to be able to see all the customers that I have that have bought a pair of red shoes, and we've always been able to do it, we've always talked about it, but we've done it with SQL. We've done it with different tools and we've done it sort of inefficiently, because I can find all the times that I've bought red shoes, but maybe, I don't know that it's me all three times that you found me.
What we're saying now is, as we build this segment, I want to know all the people who have bought red shoes, or blue shoes, or green shoes. I might fit one of those or all three of those across all of my different records. That's what we're after is bringing that back in and being able to say, "We can do it better than what we used to," it's not necessarily new. We're not necessarily unlocking anything that we haven't talked about before, but now we're able to do it hopefully with a lot less code, and hopefully in a way more efficient manner.

Gillian Bruce: Hooray, I'm cheering for admins everywhere. Let's talk a little bit about some of the specific things that maybe admins should think about when we're toying with the idea of making use of the CDP. What are some initial things that you should think about from an admin perspective in terms of strategy, when you're talking about basically implementing CDP or starting to use it?

James Richter: Sure, so the main thing that we should worry about is how do I take all of these systems and make sure I have all of the people in the room that understand each one of them? The first task that we're after is harmonizing the data, and that means looking at all the different ways that we've stored it, and all of the systems and saying, "I know that field first name is the same as field F name is the same as field F," and making sure that you've got the people in the room that represent those tools, so that they can translate that for you, and you can get the data ready. Because, like I said, we're harmonizing it, but we can't do that without the influence of the people who are responsible for those tools, and so that's really step one.

Gillian Bruce: Really important. Hey, before you start building anything, let's make sure that we understand what we're building with.

James Richter: Yeah, for sure.

Gillian Bruce: Okay, so we start that strategy, we're talking about how we're going to harmonize the data, getting the right people in the room, understanding how to translate these different, maybe similar activities, across different systems and now that we're going to pull them into one place. What are some of the cool initial wins or things that an admin might be able to look for to start saying, "Hey, look at this, this is a successful thing," what are some initial things that maybe might help get more people on board in the process of trying to put this together?

James Richter: Yeah, so I think it is going back to those use cases and showing people just how easy it is to find those records, just how easy it is to search, just how easy it is to build the segment. Just how quickly you can get the insight into what it is that you've been after for so long, and not having to go check 10 systems, and export all of that, to bring it to another place, to have to export it again, to have to get it to somewhere that you can actually do something with it. I think once you start to show off the power of, hey, I did this through clicks and not code, hey, I did this through something that's been saved and you can repeat it, that's what's getting people excited.

Gillian Bruce: Okay, so I think that's the... You just tapped into the major admin superpower right there. Because here's the thing, if you're as an admin able to save all of those steps, and all of that time, and all of that processing, I mean, that puts you in an incredible position. I mean, CDP seems like this could be a really powerful thing for an admin to use.

James Richter: For sure. Yeah, once we get that data in, and once we've had a chance to harmonize it, once we've got this thing up and running, it's really impressive. I think it makes it so that everybody's life gets easier, and that's an easy thing to advocate for. It's an easy thing to go and show off and say, "Hey, I know that you've been wanting to do this, watch," and you can actually get a feel for just how quickly it comes together. Then once you get past that, you can start to expand the use cases. We can start to get into calculating lifetime value, we can take all that data across everything and say, "I can now see how many times Gillian's made a purchase, and I don't have to wonder do I have all the records of her. If I've got that harmonization, I can actually go in and calculate that and show people the data that you've been after or the data that we've had for so long, now we can actually start to do something with it."

Gillian Bruce: I love that. Okay, so I am imagining that there might be a listener or two out there who's now saying, "Great, I am super interested in trying to figure out how I can bring this to my organization," what resources or what is out there to help an admin as they begin to basically put the business case forward for making CDP a thing for their organization?

James Richter: For sure. Yeah, so you can go out and there's a lot of great resources that we've got, a lot of blogs. I think you've got one that's recently come out that breaks down some of the content, and some of the things that we have available to work through, to figure out what is next for CDP? How do I get started? We also have a lot of great content out on Trailhead, so you can go out and take a look, and take some of those certifications, and get an idea for just exactly what it is that you're getting yourself into, and what those first steps look like. Then obviously, the marketing cloud account executive is the one that represents this at the moment, and so they can help you connect those dots. They can get the demo for you, they can show you what the tool looks like in person, and start to show you all the power that's really there.

Gillian Bruce: I love it. Yeah, you mentioned the resources that we just put out. Just actually last week we put out a CDP for admins blog post, and so yes, it does list all those resources. We'll, of course, also put those in the show notes here, there's an implementation guide, there's all kinds of great stuff. Of course, hey, Trailhead, we always love more great Trailhead content.

James Richter: The Trailhead content is really great, actually, it's been put together in a way that's a lot easier to understand. 18 months ago, I didn't know what a CDP was, and I started [inaudible] Trailhead. It definitely gets you started in a way that makes sense, and I definitely recommend checking it out.

Gillian Bruce: Awesome, I love it. Okay, so since now that you are an 18 month expert on CDP, can you talk to us a little bit about maybe are there any roadmap or fun next things you see in the CDT space for Salesforce? Anything that you can give us a little what future looking, safe harbor, forward looking statement, anything in the pipeline?

James Richter: Absolutely, you have to love the safe harbor. It's not a complete meeting if you don't mention the safe harbor. Yeah, so right now, as I mentioned, we've got a lot of use cases that we've been focused on that are marketing cloud specific. We've taught a little bit about some of the core use cases that's out there, right now, we're really focused on integrating it out, so that we can get it to more use cases. There's a lot of work being done with our partners, with our activation channels, to make sure that you can take the data from CBP and use it in lots of different app exchange packages. We want to be able to leverage that data, not just for Salesforce, but for all the different channels. I think that's where a lot of the work is being put in is how do we better orchestrate where you can go with the data?

Gillian Bruce: I love that. Hey, bringing it to the app exchange, those are other notes of music to an admin's ears, so that's fantastic. James, before I let you go, we're very happy to now have you as one of our experts in the Awesome Admin realm here. What things have you seen? You've been talking to admins, you've been talking to people working with the Salesforce platform for a while. Do you have any overall top tips that you've seen from people who have been successful in implementing either CDP, or just successful from your perspective as an admin implementing Salesforce?

James Richter: Yeah, I think it sounds silly, but I heard somebody say it at Connections last week and I love it. It's the slow is smooth and smooth is fast. As you get ready for CDP, we always buy new shiny tools and we're like, "Hey, let's go, we got to start using it right away, we got to just go." It comes down to, we got to plan. We have to plan, we have to get our data aligned, we have to get ready to go. Then once we have that understanding of the data, we can really get in there and take off. That's the biggest advice I have for anybody is plan for that time of we got to figure this thing out, and then once you get it figured out and off and running, life gets better in a hurry.

Gillian Bruce: I love that, slow is smooth and smooth is fast, that's fantastic.

James Richter: I liked it a lot, too. I didn't come up with it, obviously, but I heard it last week and I was like, "This is the highlight of Connections, I love it."

Gillian Bruce: Hey, marketers know how to make everything sound good, I mean-

James Richter: Right.

Gillian Bruce: Awesome, well, James, thank you so much for coming on the podcast and helping demystify CDP for admins. I am very excited to see what our admin community is going to start doing with it. I envision so many admins basically harnessing this technology, and really propelling not only their organizations, but their own careers forward pretty quickly, so this is great. Thank you so much.

James Richter: Yeah, thanks for having me, I really appreciate it.

Gillian Bruce: Well, thank you so much, James, for joining us and demystifying CDP. Wow, it is a powerful, powerful way to bring all of your customers' data and interactions to one single place. Hey, you talk about the ultimate awesome admin tool, I don't know about you, but I cannot wait to start playing with that and seeing it in action. CDP is great, now I love some of the points that James made about how you get ready to set yourself up for CDP. Slow is smooth and smooth as fast, words of wisdom from James. Make sure that as you get into the planning process for CDP, or even exploring if this is something that you and your organization want to do, take the time to really understand the data. Get the right people in the room to understand where the data is sitting, what it all means, and what it might look like to pull it all together, because then you'll be really set up for success when you roll out CDP.
Wow, the powerful tool it is. Check it out. Okay, as James said, there's lots of resources to help you learn more about CDP. I'll put a link to the blog post that we talked about in the show notes, as well as some great Trailhead content on CDP. Now, if you want to learn more about anything else that we mentioned today on the podcast, or anything else about how you can be an awesome admin, make sure you go to my favorite website in the whole entire world, and that is admin.salesforce.com. You'll find great blogs, videos, and some more podcasts on there. If you would like to follow my guest today, James Richter, he is very active on LinkedIn, so I'll put his LinkedIn in the show notes. You can follow all things Awesome Admin at Salesforce admin's [inaudible] on Twitter. You can follow me at Gillian K. Bruce and my co-host, Mike Gerholdt, at Mike Gerholdt. With that, I hope you have a fantastic rest of your day, thank you for tuning in, and we'll catch you next time in the cloud.

Direct download: CDP_for_Admins_with_James_Richter.mp3
Category:general -- posted at: 3:00am PST

Today on the Salesforce Admins Podcast, we talk to David Nava, Lead Solution Engineer at Salesforce, Host of Military Trailblazer Office Hours, and 20-year Navy veteran.

Join us as we talk about what to do after you pass the Admin cert, how to decide what role in the Salesforce ecosystem is right for you, and how David used the apps he built for his personal life to make an impact at a job interview.

You should subscribe for the full episode, but here are a few takeaways from our conversation with David Nava.

How David transitioned from the Navy to a Salesforce career

When last we spoke to David, he was wrapping up his career with the Navy with an eye toward transitioning into a role in the Salesforce ecosystem. On the day that he retired, he jumped right into his new career feet-first as a Junior Solution Architect at a consultancy on one of their largest projects to date.

David was recruited by Salesforce, but the story doesn’t quite go like you think it might. They turned him down at the end of the process, citing his lack of experience. However, they offered him a different role as a Solution Consultant after he pulled out his org during the interview and showed them the apps he had been creating. Most of all, they were impressed by his passion for the platform and were willing to give him a shot.

“Building apps in a dev org helps you focus on all the fundamentals,” David says, “but it also helps you really apply what you’re learning in Trailhead to specific business challenges.” He built apps to manage his workouts, track his finances from the road, and manage his tasks. He built them and rebuilt them to make something he liked, and they really made an impact when he showed them off in the interview.

Paying it forward

8 months later he was recruited internally for his current role, as a Lead Solution Engineer to replace legacy systems for the Navy and Marine Corps. He’s now in a position where he can draw on his years of experience as an officer and replace all the systems he didn’t like using.

David’s always been serious about mentorship, and now he’s in a place where he can give back. He teamed up with Bill Kuehler and Resource Hero to be a part of Military Trailblazer Office Hours focused on career and branding. Since then, he’s helped almost 2,000 people earn certifications, choose career paths, and get hired with his live sessions and YouTube videos.

How to test-drive career paths

So once you get your Admin certification, now what? David advises several people in exactly this position. He recommends you start by “test driving” the career path options by conducting informational interviews with professionals in those roles. “You need to learn about the role’s requirements, responsibilities, challenges, and joys so that you get a sense for what it’s like to work in that role,” he says.

David’s also a big fan of the Salesforce Admins Skills Kit. It gives you a framework for how to think about your skills beyond just the technical aspects. “You can apply your different work experience in the context of these skills to demonstrate its relevance to the Salesforce Admin role,” he says.

Be sure to listen to the full episode for all of David’s great insights, and especially make sure to catch his five tips to help people transition into a new Salesforce career.

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Direct download: Transferrable_Skills_with_David_Nava.mp3
Category:general -- posted at: 3:00am PST

Today on the Salesforce Admins Podcast, we talk to Jennifer Lee, Admin Evangelist at Salesforce and the host of Automation Hour.

Join us as we talk about everything in the Summer ‘22 Release, what Jennifer does to prep for an upcoming release, 

You should subscribe for the full episode, but here are a few takeaways from our conversation with Jennifer Lee.

Summer ‘22 highlights

The Summer ‘22 Release is out, and we’re here to help you get caught up on all the action. To help us, we’ve brought legendary blogger and automation expert Jennifer Lee on the pod to go over all the highlights.

There are a lot of changes to Picklists that are going to make them better than ever. You can bulk update several Picklists at once and it finally tells you which one is a duplicate without you having to guess. Dynamic Related Lists have been added to App Builder beta, which gives you the ability to filter unrelated lists. Flow Trigger Explorer changes, Screen Flows in Slack, and automated Flow testing are other bright spots in a jampacked release.

Tips for release readiness

Jennifer’s been known for a long time in the community for her comprehensive release posts. So how does she prepare for a new release?

  • Stay motivated: There are a lot of release notes to read, and you need to stay committed to getting through everything so you’re prepared.
  • Dive into a pre-release org: “It’s on thing to just read the little blurb,” Jen says, “but when you actually get to see it and touch it, that’s when it really comes to life.”
  • Make what you’ve learned shareable: Jen uses animated GIFs to bring the changes to life in her blog, which you are free to steal or iterate on in your own release readiness prep.

Release Readiness Live

Jennifer is the host of Admin Release Readiness Live, where all the product experts at Salesforce come on the show to present their features and get you ready for what’s coming. You also get to see a roadmap of what’s coming next and the vision of where everything is going. Or at least some forward-looking statements.

Most importantly, you can tune in and ask the experts any questions you may have, live. It’s the best way to get the admin-specific updates you want to hear.

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Direct download: Summer_22_Release_with_Jennifer_Lee.mp3
Category:general -- posted at: 3:00am PST

Today on the Salesforce Admins Podcast, we talk to Nana Gregg, Solution Architect and Learning and Development Manager at VFP Consulting.

Join us as we talk about the Salesforce Admin Skills Kit, why your background matters much more than you think when you’re trying to be an Admin, and why the Skills Kit helps employers looking to hire Admins, too.

You should subscribe for the full episode, but here are a few takeaways from our conversation with Nana Gregg.

Nana’s EASY Methodology

You might recognize Nana from her stint as an Admin Keynote speaker at Dreamforce ‘18. “What I said to Parker is that it’s actually easy to be an Awesome Admin,” she says, but that’s an acronym for her EASY Methodology:

  • E: Embrace change. Everything changes in tech every single day, and you need to embrace that and go with it.
  • A: Always be learning. There are three new releases a year, not to mention what’s happening in your business and org.
  • S: Show and tell. As Nana says, “When you build it, they will come.” Show what you’re working on and tell them about it!
  • Y: You got this, and if you need help, you have the power of the community behind you.

Your background is just as valuable as your tech skills

With the recent launch of the Admins Skills Kit, we wanted to talk to Nana about how that squares with her EASY Methodology. It’s a recipe for success for Admins and also a guide to help employers figure out what to look for when they’re hiring.

As an accidental Admin, Nana can relate to just how many skills you need to bring to your job that aren’t necessarily technology-facing. No matter your background, there are skills you’ve picked up along your journey that can help you to succeed as an Admin and now you can name them and market them. She sees how things like learner’s mindset, change management, and project management fits into the framework she laid out at Dreamforce four years ago.

Why the Skills Kit matters to employers

As someone who now is in the position to hire Admins, Nana also appreciates how helpful the Admin Skills Kit is as a framework for people making that job posting. When you’re sitting on the other side of it, you might see “Salesforce” and throw in every developer buzz word you can think of hoping you’re saying the right thing, or you might see “Administrator” and go with that.

The Skills Kit not only lists out everything that goes into being an Admin and doing it well, it also gives concrete examples to let both Admins and employers know exactly what they’re looking for. And if you need help, each skill also has resources to help you Always be learning.

Be sure to listen to the full episode for all the great insights, including why S should maybe stand for Showcase your skills, and how the community helped Nana rebuild after a tornado hit her house.

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Direct download: Admin_Skills_Kit_with_Nana_Gregg.mp3
Category:general -- posted at: 3:00am PST

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