Our takeaways from Dreamforce18: new frontiers for the Customer Relationship Management
Last week Alessandro Galetto, Luca Mascaro and Marco Tamburlini attended Dreamforce 18 in San Francisco. Here some of their takeaways from the conference:
“We can’t tell about our experience at Dreamforce without speaking about San Francisco. Every time I visit it — tells Marco Tamburlini — , I’m stunned to see a city that can change and evolve with a pace that no other city has, and last week made no exception.
San Francisco is a square grid of 7 by 7 miles (that’s where the San Francisco 49ers took their name from) where people move and connect in multiple ways. Uber is the most common transportation form and is now transforming again the way people move with a new service: Uber Express Pool. This service allows people to spend even less than Uber Poll, by saving some time for the driver, asking each user to take a walk to the most convenient spot on the shared trip with other Uber riders. This last mile is introducing a bunch of new micro-transportation tools, such as long-boards, mono-wheels, boosted boards (electric boards) and much more, to serve a new micro-mobility system to move and meet on the physical grid. It was nice to see that every person was choosing its own personal way.
A few miles away, Facebook was introducing a new device to connect people on a much bigger scale: Oculus Quest. That VR set is the opportunity to make virtual reality scale to the mass market and turn it to mainstream to virtually connect people around the world without the need of moving.
The Bay Area is the place where new technology applications are created every day, where the boundaries of what’s possible are moved forward and where people adapt to an ever-changing environment”.
A new breed of bespoke opportunities
Alessandro Galetto explains: “171000 attendees, 2700 talks and, we guess, thousands of side meetings in a gorgeous location are the numbers that can give you an idea of what Salesforce is today. If you live in the digital ecosystem, this is an event you cannot miss. If we look at the history of Salesforce so far, we can say they have evolved like no one in their segment, and they have gone far beyond that. They have been able to forge, and nurture, a complete ecosystem of integrated product and services. Sales, Support, Marketing Automation, e-commerce. You name it, and they have it.
Artificial Intelligence is starting to invade all of these segments, and they are ready. We have seen so many incredible uses of their Einstein platform that we have wondered if we, humans, will still be needed to perform some tasks.
We have been impressed by their ability to create an engaged ecosystem of partners and users that share their experience with others. A proper community and definitely a case study to be deeply analysed.
Technically speaking they are one of the coolest companies in the world”.
“The impact of Dreamforce on the city has been impressive: 4 blocks of San Francisco have been locked to allow the attendants to move around and Metallica was the band invited to entertain people on a concert night.
The company owns the highest building in town, to make sure, not only with the 5-days conference, that everyone is aware of its influence. Those five days were impressing though — tells Marco Tamburlini — . It’s clear how Salesforce is not just a simple CRM now, but a set of tools and technologies to reach every one of us and serve us with customised tools to deliver a “segment of one” experience both to the final user and the workforce.
Salesforce CRM is a combination of all the latest technology on the market, maximising chances of revenues for the company that embrace it, but (let’s be honest) enabling a personalised journey for every one of us.
A combination of AI, voice assistance, big data analysis, machine learning and marketing automation is what can make the difference in everyday life. When we move and use different products and services, we don’t see what’s running behind the scenes, but it looks like tools like Salesforce are right there to make everything happen”.
What about design?
“As designers — continues Marco Tamburlini — we must consider how these tools are improving and shaping new forms of design, where we no longer need to conceive just interfaces, service and business models, but a much more complex ecosystem where new tech capabilities will make the difference, serving each one as a unique person. Tools are evolving and impacting experience design (and design in general) like never before. Our mission to improve people experiences has new weapons we’ll have to master over time, to make our life on the physical and digital grid more and more unique”.
“Well, let’s say that Customer Experience and User eXperience have been the essence of this conference — adds Alessandro Galetto — With the tools they have, they can definitely help their customers deliver any kind of experience they can think of. Our take is that “there is no power without control.”
The design is going to be a significant part of any Salesforce project, and we think we can help our customers to address these challenges”.
But there is more than business
“We have been impressed by their statements about social responsibility. Salesforce is based in a wealthy city, San Francisco, but you can just turn the corner, and you will find hundreds of people that need assistance and help — tells us Alessandro Galetto — Many of the talks during the conference have tried to address this problem, and we have been impressed by the effort that most of the mayors of the Bay Area are putting in to solve this issues. This is something we all need to think about and stand up for. You know, there is (still) a business ethic we want to stick with”.
Diversity is a fact, inclusion is a choice — Libby Schaaf — Oakland Mayor.
