8 Proven Salesforce Use Cases for Business Success

As a top-rated CRM software, Salesforce offers a range of cloud-based products that allows you to experience streamlined business processes.

These products cater especially to organizations’ sales, marketing, and service teams. No matter where these teams are, Salesforce allows them to meet and connect under a single platform. Using Salesforce, they can seamlessly communicate and share information with other teams, customers, and partners.

Not only that, the Salesforce CRM cloud computing system is dynamic. It offers diverse solutions to Salesforce customers so businesses serve their clients better and more easily.

Consequently, Salesforce users will continue to discover how to solve new problems encountered during sales processes through seamless integration on the platform. You’d be surprised how efficiently Salesforce can solve the issue your business has been experiencing!

In this blog post, I am going to show you 2 different Salesforce use cases, each for the four most widely used Salesforce products:

• Salesforce Sales Cloud
• Salesforce Service Cloud
• Salesforce Marketing Cloud
• Salesforce Experience Cloud

So, if you want to improve your business systems with Salesforce, keep reading to get insights on how to apply the solutions!

Salesforce Use Cases – Sales Cloud

Salesforce Sales Cloud is a CRM platform designed to help sales teams automate their sales process. This includes customer relationship management, quoting, and other activities involved in the sales cycle and deals closing.

As a business, Sales Cloud aims to help you manage your sales pipeline better, keep track of customer data and close more deals. It aims to reduce manual work and costs and improve the productivity of your sales team while hitting your sales targets for each period.

What does Salesforce Sales Cloud do?

• It helps you reach prospects via digital channels, including messaging apps and chats like Facebook messenger, email, SMS, and more.
• It can leverage Einstein artificial intelligence to automate the sales process and obtain faster better results.
• It helps you manage your sales team better, monitor the performance of reps and your marketing activities, and predict sales.
• Easily track leads, individuals, companies, and partners of your business. You can access relevant records easily to make informed decisions or collaborate with others.
• Import up to 50,000 leads and contacts simultaneously via multiple options, like the Data Import Wizard and the Einstein Activity Capture.
• Provides the ultimate training guide to help you onboard successfully, understand the Sales Cloud user interface, and produce better results.

See different Salesforce use cases for the Sales Cloud CRM below;

Sales Cloud Use Case 1 – Steady Stamps

Steady Stamps is a company producing stamps, envelopes, and other packaging products. The company distributes the products to over 40,000 retailers and sells them to end users via its website.

Steady Stamps has a separate sales, marketing, and CRM team that work together to generate leads, convert prospects in stages, and hit the company’s sales targets. However, based on the processes and results, the managers decided the resources available weren’t being optimized.

They faced the following issues;

Problems

• Communication between teams was slow and tedious.
• The operational cost was going above budget with no significant change in the ROI.
• They generated leads but could not move the required number to the deal-closing stage.
• The sales process was complex and time-consuming, making it difficult to streamline its operations.
• Their large customer base was growing and getting tough to manage.

Solution And Outcomes

Steady Stamps upgraded its sales, marketing, and customer management system to make its target sales realizable. The team leaders of the said departments designed a Salesforce Sales system using both inbuilt and third-party applications.

Steady Stamps could manage its sales pipeline more effectively. Lead tracking, drafting proposals, resource allocation, follow-up activities, and lead prioritization were possible with Sales Cloud.

They cut costs and processing time through automation and intelligence tools. The sales pipeline was also simpler to understand and manage by the team members.

The CRM team could easily engage leads and customers via multiple channels and track their cases. Customer experience also improved, thanks to Einstein and powerful engagement tools.

The three teams could communicate better and access information faster on prospects.

Sales Cloud Use Case 2 – R² Pet Foods

R² Pet Foods is a pet food company producing various foods and treats for dogs and cats of different breeds. The company also produces pet health products, like medications and dietary supplements. It has over 20 manufacturing facilities and customers spread across the globe.

Problems

• Some of the products were moving slower than the rest. The company needed to create more awareness for products in that category.
• It was tedious to access information, and communication between teams was fraught with friction.
• The sales process needed to be adjusted for better results. Stats and clear analytics were needed for this.
• A more effective campaign, accounts, and lead management system were needed.

Solution And Outcomes

R² Pet Foods had new hires to lead their sales and marketing team. They completed the company’s onboarding on Salesforce Sales Cloud and designed a unique system to manage the sales process more efficiently.

The sales and marketing team experienced increased productivity thanks to robust features like Visual Workflow, Einstein insights, Click to Close, and more. They were able to generate more leads, recognize priority prospects, and close more deals.

Decision-making was much more informed because of the detailed insights, dashboards, prediction tools, and reports from the CRM platform. The reps could access customer data and optimize campaigns with personalized messaging across multiple channels.

The teams were able to adjust their sales process based on the insights, which helped push the sales of products that weren’t selling well.

Salesforce Use Cases – Service Cloud

Salesforce Service Cloud is a CRM product that assists businesses in providing adequate client support. It is packed with robust intelligent productivity tools, including consoles, multi-channel, communities, collaboration, and more features.

As a business, implementing Service Cloud will enable you to support your customers efficiently anytime and anywhere.

What does Salesforce Service Cloud do?

• Manage cases more efficiently and proffer solutions faster to client problems.
• Provides automated processes with built-in tools and boosts customer service team performance with service analytics.
• Delivers personalized customer experience with intelligent chatbots, lowering costs across channels.
• Brings together a customer’s queries across all channels under a single ticketing system.
• Enables self-service by assisting customers in finding answers to their questions independently.
• Save cost generally with Einstein bots and Omni channel support.
• Matches cases with the best customer reps to handle them.

See the Salesforce Use Cases for the Service Cloud below;

Service Cloud Use Case 1 – Leo Microfinance Bank

Leo MFB is a financial institution offering banking services online. Its business operations, from creating accounts to withdrawals, loans, and other transactions, take place virtually.

Due to the business’s nature, multiple channels for customer support were created. Leo MFB users could reach the support team by emailing support@leomfb.com, calling the service number, creating a ticket via their website, or chatting with a customer rep.

Leo MFB did a promotion that yielded great results. More customers registered with the bank and used their services but were unprepared for the turnout. This resulted in more work for the support team, and an upgrade was needed to manage the customers more efficiently.

Problems

• New customer inquiries continue to come in from multiple sources with an inadequate system to cater to them.
• Due to the volume of transactions, there’s a continuous system glitch causing technical issues. There’s an increase in disputes and complaints made by customers.
• Hiring more employees in the customer support department does not seem cost-effective.
• Due to the slow processing of the cases, high-priority tickets don’t get the much-needed attention.
• Information flow had friction between team members and inter-department.

Solution And Outcomes

Leo MFB chose a multi-cloud system and integrated with Experience Cloud and Service Cloud to cater to both the front-end and back-end.

With powerful inbuilt tools, like communities and AI chatbots, Leo MFB was able to understand its customer’s needs and preferences better. The support team provided personalized services to the clients and improved overall satisfaction.

Case management became much easier with the Einstein Case Classification tool. It gave personalized recommendations based on previous cases and helped the team improve customers’ experiences. It was also automated, helping the bank to reduce operational costs along the way.

All teams and departments were able to communicate better with the cloud integrations. Access to information was much easier, and collaboration was more effective.

Salesforce Einstein artificial intelligence recommends knowledge articles to help the support team members find answers faster, assigning cases to suitable agents and providing them with guidelines. Some customers who make inquiries or lodge complaints via multiple channels had the issues pooled under a single ticket. High-priority tickets were also easily identified and solved faster.

Service Cloud Use Case 2 – Racks Online Retail Store

Racks is an online retail store offering hosting services for businesses selling clothes and footwear. It has a large customer base, with more businesses migrating to the marketplace periodically.

With over 8 million users worldwide, Racks had an influx of customer inquiries, complaints, and disputes to solve daily. However, its CRM system at that time was not adequate.

Problems

• Many tickets were left hanging for days before a customer rep attended to them.
• Racks hired more people into the customer support teams, but it was not cost-effective.
• Many customers complained about the unresponsiveness of the customer support team.
• Reps needed a better system to help them find solutions to customers’ problems faster.
• Communication between reps and the technical, dispute, and other relevant teams had friction.
• Racks Online retail store needed to reduce the overall cost of customer service.

Solution And Outcomes

Racks contracted a Salesforce administrator to design a solution on the Salesforce Service Cloud that would help reduce the friction in the customer support system.

The Agent Workspace feature on the Service Console helped the support team manage cases, accounts, and orders more efficiently. Using the case management tool, they could document, track, and organize customer queries and resolve them faster.

Service Cloud provided automated processes which allowed the team to respond to customer demands faster. There were templates, auto reminders, drag and drop functions and more to cut out the manual work and speed up response time. The chat service was also available to swiftly help customers in real-time.

The support team could provide personalized services to customers because they could access histories, including previous cases, contact, and other relevant information.

Team members also received better guidance using the Omni-channel case routing and Knowledge management features. After adding the features to the Agent Workspace, they found relevant articles and cases to solve customer problems appropriately and timely. The Omni-channel routing routes customer requests to the most suitable agents. This eliminated the need to reassign tasks or transfer calls that could have caused delays.

Support team leaders were able to monitor the performance of their team members with the real-time insights provided on Service Cloud. They could access detailed reports of the team’s progress and individual performances. The metrics also allowed them to identify areas that needed change, and they were able to implement better solutions for customer satisfaction.

Salesforce Use Cases – Marketing Cloud

Salesforce Marketing Cloud is a platform that helps to streamline marketing processes in a business. It makes it easier for individuals and companies to monitor those marketing efforts under a single platform.

With Salesforce Marketing Cloud, you can upgrade your digital marketing tactics, build a mutually beneficial strong relationship with clients, and improve your overall brand perception.

What does Salesforce Marketing Cloud do?

• Automates email and marketing processes
• Allows personalized real-time customer engagement.
• Enables multi-channel messaging and advertisement.
• Provides comprehensive cumulative and individual analysis of customer marketing strategies.
• Allows personalized messaging where new messages are derived based on previous interactions and current conditions.
• It helps you understand your customers better by capturing relevant data and presenting a unified vision of them.

Here are two Salesforce Use Cases under the Marketing Cloud to show you how the product works;

Salesforce Marketing Cloud Use Case 1 – SunBeam Digitals

SunBeam Digitals is a digital marketing firm offering SEO services to small businesses worldwide. It mainly provides off-page, on-page, and technical SEO, website development, content management, and social media management services.

SunBeam Digitals works with Ox Distribution, a freight forwarding company where it manages all its marketing activities. As the contracted marketing team for Ox Distribution, SunBeam is saddled with the responsibility of creating brand awareness, generating quality leads, and collaborating with the company’s sales team to convert them.

Problems

• Customer data pooling was mostly manual.
• SunBeam Digitals could not hit the target lead number needed to actualize the sales process goals.
• Frequent delays in accomplishing marketing goals.
• Communication between relevant departments was not as smooth as expected.
• Some customer data was lost in the transfer process.
• The current customer relationship management system was plagued with technical issues.

Solution And Outcomes

SunBeam Digitals decided to utilize the Salesforce platform for its processes. They integrated Marketing Cloud into their activities and got the following results;

• Automatically connected all customer data faster in real-time, which allowed them to understand each customer and create a better experience.
• Cut down costs on lead and customer acquisition and advertising by using automated processes and working with AI.
• Used Einstein GPT to engage customers more efficiently via sms and email messages.
• Team members across the marketing and sales departments could share and access information faster and easier with the organized system.
• Used Salesforce Einstein insights and metrics for lead scoring. This helped them recognize which prospects were likely to convert, yielding more deals.

Marketing Cloud Use Case 2 – Quantum Lounge

Quantum Lounge is a club offering hospitality experiences to tourists and residents in Ohio. It also operates a nightclub and throws themed parties occasionally for interested participants.

The lounge was new; they had to find customers from scratch and gain their trust. The lounge also needed effective PR for its parties to increase their awareness.

Problems

• The lounge experienced a low turnout at the parties.
• They lacked adequate public awareness and favorable perception.
• Quantum Lounge was not hitting its sales goals.
• Competitors used advanced CRM systems, which yielded more conversions.
• Limited budget to run multiple promotions across channels.
• Customer retention was almost impossible because customer information was unorganized and untraceable.

Solution And Outcomes

Quantum Lounge contracted a professional for Salesforce development to build an effective marketing system on the Marketing Cloud.

• The lead data generated were organized appropriately, so each profile has all the information about the prospect.
• Marketing automation enabled the sales team to process their activities faster, including messaging, data generation, and actionable insights.
• They were able to study customer behavior better and engage them accordingly. This improved the public perception of the lounge to a large extent.
• Overall marketing performance improved, thanks to Einstein insights helping them recognize priority leads.
• The service agents could access the business’s knowledge base to answer customer inquiries and solve issues.

Salesforce Use Cases – Experience Cloud

Salesforce Experience Cloud, formerly Community Cloud, is a CRM platform that allows partners, customers, and employees to share information that can assist people with related needs to solve their problems faster.

As a business, using Salesforce Experience Cloud will allow you to connect all your primary stakeholders with each other. They will all have access to data and records to streamline their business processes. All that allows customers to enjoy better experiences using your services or products.

What does Salesforce Experience Cloud do?

• Build a community of trust with your customers.
• Help customers connect and assist each other with practical solutions and vital information.
• Connect your suppliers, agents, partners, and other external parties involved in your sales process to accelerate deals.
• Help your employees meet, connect, and collaborate with others in their field.
• Create multiple communities for diverse use cases as required by your business.

See Salesforce use cases of the Experience Cloud in the next section.

Experience Cloud Use Case 1 – Carter Consultancy Services

Carter Consultancy is a professional service company offering industry-specific labor and expertise in the consulting industry. It has 35 employees serving 102 small businesses, providing pro advice, guidance, and practical solutions to their problems.

Carter Consultancy focuses mainly on providing HR consulting services. Its major roles include developing human resource models, recruiting and training new employees, and providing procedure guidance and advice.

Due to the nature of the business, Carter Consultancy has implemented a couple of CRM systems that all failed to meet expectations.

Problems

• Issues retaining clients due to several glitches in communication.
• Sales Pipeline management isn’t streamlined.
• Carter Consultancy is behind on digital trends. New digital-savvy competitors are entering the market and gaining competitive advantages.
• Carter Consultancy needs to upgrade its cyber security to protect confidential client information. The firm has faced data breaches in the past.
• Effective communication, easy access to information, and collaboration had friction on clients’ and employees’ ends.
• Customer management is cumbersome due to increased customers and their demands.

Solution And Outcomes

Carter Consultancy firm migrated from its previous CRM to Salesforce Experience Cloud to improve its sales process and customer management.

Communities were created to help customers and employees interact better. Information and expert solutions are shared in the groups to assist those with problems.

Salesforce Experience Cloud provided a centralized client information database where employees could access their histories, contact details, and other useful details. This allowed faster access to relevant info and the ability to provide personalized services to the clients.

Communication and task management were much easier. Team leaders could track the assignments, check progress, set deadlines, follow up, and collaborate effectively with their team members. The firm also experienced better collaboration with its clients. The customers can track projects, make suggestions, and share reviews. This helped Carter Consultancy to build a stronger bond with its clients.

Security is prioritized on Salesforce Experience. The platform provided several security measures, including enabling clickjack protection, encrypting data, authenticating users, using Lightning Locker, and more. Customer data were more protected and less prone to compromise.

Experience Cloud Use Case 2 – West Lane Online University

West Lane Online is an educational institution offering students professional courses and certification virtually in business administration. Depending on the syllabuses, it hosts different courses on Kajabi, where students can access them sequentially or at once.

On Kajabi, West Lane Online can upload texts, photos, files, and videos via an integration called Wistia. The online learning platform can market its courses and sell them with the robust marketing tools available on the Kajabi hosting platform.

However, Kajabi was simply insufficient to manage their educational processes, especially where CRM was concerned.

Problems

• A platform that supports engagement and community building.
• Information sharing to become seamless and effective for course instructors and students.
• Provide personalized experience to students seamlessly.
• Course instructors need to access needed information anytime without waiting on colleagues.

Solution And Outcomes

West Lane Online embraced Salesforce to upgrade its learning and teaching process.

Multiple communities were built to serve different purposes, including class announcements, internship opportunities, alumni associations, and others aligning with the business’s visions. This helped students to gather information, collaborate, and relate with others based on their career paths. They also gain access to many opportunities that can help launch their careers.

Salesforce Experience automated community processes, allowing increased communication, support, and engagement efficiency. Information dissemination is faster, clearer, and more effective.

Course instructors can easily access information on students to track their learning progress and understand their interests. This helped the instructors provide more personalized content to their students.

The students could share their experiences, leave reviews, and drop suggestions about the courses and teaching modes.

Both the instructors and students could also access the communities on the go because Salesforce is mobile-friendly.

Salesforce CRM Use Cases – Wrapping Up

There you have it! Those are some of the various Salesforce use cases where Experience Cloud, Sales Cloud, Service Cloud, and Marketing Cloud are concerned.

Salesforce CRM has other powerful products for process automation, like Commerce Cloud, Analytics Cloud, Salesforce Einstein, and more, that can also be instrumental in leveling up your business.

The key is identifying your challenges and selecting the most suitable Salesforce product(s) for your case. Fortunately, all these products can be used in most companies across industries!