Build Your Data Cloud Usage Strategy
Data Cloud presents a new and interesting challenge for architects working in the Salesforce ecosystem: How do we consider and design for usage-based products in our solutions? We want to architect the best possible solution for our stakeholders, while making it clear to those same stakeholders that they are getting optimal value from their investment.
According to the Well-Architected framework,“strategy in architecture means systems are thoughtfully planned and delivered. It means delivery and maintenance teams have a clear view of the work to be done today and in the future, and everyone is aligned around the “why” of the work to be done. It means urgent requests can be triaged effectively and efficiently, and stakeholders can clearly understand the impacts and trade-offs of requests.”
This post will walkthrough how to leverage the basics of a well-architected approach to strategy, and apply those principles to credit usage patterns in Data Cloud.
Prioritize the business drivers
The key to making strategic decisions about usage in Data Cloud is starting with an accurate and clear sense of how the business would approach prioritization. This can be tricky at times, but it’s a critical skill for architects that involves measuring value, building trust with stakeholders, and measuring your outcomes.
Start by getting a solid sense of the data. Once you have a clear set of the different business problems Data Cloud can help your organization solve, look at the metrics attached to those functional areas. Measure the potential business value of each use case by attaching KPIs such as revenue generation, customer satisfaction, operational efficiency, and lifetime value. You can get an idea of how to think about, organize, and measure KPIs by referencing our KPI Spreadsheet Template.
Next, estimate the Data Cloud usage costs associated with each use case around activities like data ingestion, transformation, identity resolution, and segmentation. (Refer to this article from Salesforce Help to better understand Data Cloud Billable Usage types.)
After you gather the data, you need to get a clear understanding of the motivations of different business units in your organization. You need to engage with key stakeholders, including marketing, sales, IT, and finance teams, to gather their perspectives and the unit’s priorities as it relates to usage. You may be surprised at the range of views — the marketing team might prioritize segmentation and activation for targeted campaigns, while the IT team might focus on data ingestion and transformation. Don’t be discouraged, experiencing this tension is a critical step to help you appreciate the complexity of the big picture.
Once you’ve done the calculations and met with your stakeholders, it’s time to assess the different types of benefits that can be tied to your use cases. As an aid, you can use our Data Cloud Usage Prioritization Template to help you capture and prioritize usage of both tangible and intangible benefits in a single sheet.
- Tangible: These are usually measurable, and include benefits like increased sales, improved customer retention, and reduced operational costs
- Intangible: These are usually the harder-to-measure benefits including, enhanced customer experience, reduced internal friction, and better decision-making insight for stakeholders.
Leverage your conversations and calculations to finalize your usage prioritization plan, ensuring it balances immediate high-ROI initiatives with strategic long-term goals. This will enable a more structured and impactful implementation of Data Cloud.
Usage considerations for your roadmap
Now that you have prioritized your business drivers, it’s important to plot out the correct sequencing of the work by putting the work onto a roadmap.
As stated in the Well-Architected framework, a roadmap “aligns every stakeholder about the ‘why’ of work ahead.” When it comes to usage, one “below-the surface” benefit of thoughtful and well-executed roadmaps is that they begin to tell the value story that Data Cloud is bringing to your organization over time.
Roadmaps are often categorized into two styles to support business (feature) and technical audiences (systems). Architects should determine the appropriate granularity for each type of roadmap based on the level of the stakeholder audience within the organization (Check out our Architects’ Guide to Effective Roadmaps).
The technical roadmap should start with foundational features such as initial data ingestion and harmonization. The business roadmap should start by delivering on an initial use cases that shows value quickly and builds stakeholder goodwill, such as segmentation for marketing campaigns or automated reporting. As the roadmaps evolve, you can add more advanced features such as real-time data ingestion and AI capabilities to amplify your gains.
For each feature on the roadmap, note the estimated number of credits that will be used. Tally the total credits used per phase and your roadmap gives you an “at a glance” understanding of credit usage.
In addition to planning for business evolution, capitalizing on growth, and spotting opportunities, business roadmaps provide a way to ensure that IT spend aligns to the overall business vision. Conversely, technical roadmaps help IT stakeholder see the bigger picture and allocate technical budget and resources.
Governance
With Data Cloud it’s more important than ever to ensure that inefficient or inappropriate usages are identified and mitigated, while intentional usage is promoted throughout the process. Managing this is the role of governance.
“Good governance is about making it hard for bad customizations to get past the early stages of development, and getting good customizations into production predictably and consistently” — Salesforce Well-Architected
Here are a few examples of how to build usage considerations into your governance:
- Work requests: When functionality or features are submitted around Data Cloud, have users provide information about usage on the request form.
- Work approvers: Does the approver have a solid understanding of how usage works in Data Cloud, how it’s calculated, how it’s prioritized, and where it fits into the roadmap? Safeguards on usage should be built into the approval process, for example an approver must be required to get written approval from the CFO if the credit usage exceeds the estimate by more than 1 percent.
- Access controls and security: Design access policies and permissions that only allow appropriate users to access high-credit functions in Data Cloud, such as identity resolution and real-time data processing.
- Monitoring and notifications: Your governing body must make a point to regularly check-in on and understand what’s driving credit usage. This can be done through reports, dashboards, notifications, and audit trails.
- ROI calculations: Calculating the ROI for the business as it relates to credits used is paramount for good governance. Using both the tangible and intangible value points outlined above, attach business return generated to each credit that you invested in with Salesforce. The governing body should calculate and review this ROI regularly.
Conclusion
As architects, our role in strategically managing Data Cloud usage extends well beyond technical considerations. By prioritizing use cases, crafting thoughtful roadmaps, and including usage considerations into governance, we set the stage for sustainable, value-driven solutions. Remember, intentional architecture isn’t just about building efficiently — it’s about aligning technology with business objectives and stakeholder expectations. By embracing these principles, you can ensure that Data Cloud not only meets immediate demands but also drives long-term success for your organization.
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