Questions to Help you Select a Salesforce Implementation Partner for SMBs

This article was written to help small-medium sized companies select the appropriate Salesforce implementation partner while on their CRM journey.

Selecting the right system integrator/consulting partner can be a major undertaking. It includes research, interviews, and most importantly — time. If you’re a small-medium sized company tackling competing priorities, this can quickly become a stressful process..

To help guide you with selecting the right choice for your business, here are a few questions to ask your system integrator before signing a contract with them.

1.What is your previous experience implementing Salesforce for [Business Type/ Industry/ Specific Salesforce Cloud]?

Understanding the partner’s specific experience in your domain can save you time and resources in the future, as they’ll be able to provide recommendations and share best practices. Be wary if the partner doesn’t ask questions and push back when you’re scoping and sharing requests. There’s a good chance that the approach you’re thinking of in your head isn’t the best one, and if they’re not using their own experience to guide you towards something better, that may be a red flag. Remember — you don’t know what you don’t know. If you and your team don’t have solid experience with Salesforce Implementation, it’s essential that your consulting partner is able to steer you in the right direction.

2. What is your implementation methodology?

Understanding how your project will be delivered is key in helping to set expectations with team members that will be involved with the implementation. Ask if your partner follows an agile methodology or a traditional waterfall delivery. Opting for a partner that uses agile delivery methodology is probably the easier choice. Starting off with an MVP, and then adding things as you go can make your life a lot more simple. It’s usually best to crawl, walk, then run with your Salesforce instance.

3. How will pricing work?

Before a partner can provide you with a quote for the total cost of implementation, they will need to complete a discovery process with you to scope out the project and price. As they learn about your previous platform and business processes, they’ll draft a statement of work (SOW) for you that outlines the work that will be done. Don’t be afraid to request the addition/removal of things — for the most part, partners will be happy to adjust the SOW for you. Be cautious if you are given a price without any discovery — partners truly cannot know the level of effort that will be required without any discovery or questions asked about your environment.

Selecting the right Salesforce implementation partner is important for strategic projects, augmenting your workforce, or just helping you with general adoption of the Salesforce platform. Take your time with it and do your homework.

Here are a few additional tips to help you research partners for your next Salesforce project.

• Search for recent CSAT responses on the App exchange.
• Request time to speak to a reference or two
• Time & Materials vs Fixed Fee projects