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Slack Supercharges Salesforce Customer 360 for Sales, Service, Marketing, and Analytics

Companies like IBM and Sonos are achieving success from anywhere with Slack-First Customer 360, a single platform for connecting employees, customers, partners with the apps and workflows they need to get work done

SAN FRANCISCO — August 17, 2021 — Salesforce (NYSE: CRM), the global leader in CRM, today announced new innovations that combine the power of Slack and Salesforce so teams can stay connected, productive, and get work done anywhere — with a single source of truth for their business.

“Salesforce and Slack are creating the digital HQ to help every company adapt and get back to growth in this digital-first, work anywhere world,” said Bret Taylor, President and Chief Operating Officer of Salesforce. “This is just the beginning for the Slack-First Customer 360 – which will fundamentally reshape how work gets done by connecting employees, customers and partners and the apps they use on a single platform.”

This is just the beginning for the Slack-First Customer 360 – which will fundamentally reshape how work gets done by connecting employees, customers and partners and the apps they use on a single platform.

Bret Taylor, President and Chief Operating Officer, Salesforce

Nine out of 10 companies plan to combine remote and onsite work going forward, but only 33% feel prepared to navigate this new hybrid work world. Slack-First Customer 360 is the answer, with Slack as the hub that empowers everyone in an organization to communicate, collaborate, and take action on information from across Salesforce and all the other business apps, systems, and partners they use. 

With these new pre-built integrations between Slack and Salesforce, every department — such as sales, service, and marketing — can collaborate in channels that unite teams and streamline workflows built around CRM data, giving them a single source of truth for their business and a single, shared view of the customer. Business processes can be automated in Slack to make work simple, productive, flexible and pleasant. And with Slack Connect, companies can now work securely with external partners, vendors and customers, driving stronger relationships and faster results. 

Close more deals with Slack-First Sales

Salesforce and Slack are giving sales reps the ability to collaborate on deals in real-time and drive growth from anywhere, with sales reps using Slack seeing an average of 15% faster sales cycles. The new capabilities provide deeper visibility into account details in Sales Cloud and connect the right people to close deals fast – all in Slack as the system of engagement.

  • Digital deal rooms allow sales teams to securely collaborate around a customer or deal cycle in Slack. Sales reps can access and update Salesforce records and meeting information right from Slack. With files, conversations, and data in one place, teams can easily prepare for meetings, new reps can quickly onboard by accessing account details in Slack, and external partners and customers can join in directly to close deals fast.
  • Automated daily briefs in Slack help reps focus on what matters most by providing them with a personalized daily list of tasks, meetings and priority deals they can take action on. 
  • Slack-First Sales - Sales Team Channel
  • Slack-First Sales - Deal Room on Mobile Device

Resolve cases faster with Slack-First Service

Through Salesforce and Slack, teams can collaborate to provide real-time customer support, bringing customers directly into the channel when necessary. Service agents get instant access to relevant Service Cloud case data, experts and channels in Slack, resulting in an 11% improvement in customer satisfaction scores. These Slack-First innovations help service teams automatically identify and bring the right experts into a case, accelerating customer response times. 

  • Swarming creates a Slack channel for service teams to collaborate on complex and high priority cases, bringing in the right employee and external partners to solve problems faster. 
  • Expert Finder automatically identifies the right experts to add to a swarm channel based on availability, capacity, and skills. 
With Slack-First Service, service teams can swarm in a Slack channel, bringing the right experts together to solve complex cases.

Manage campaigns effectively with Slack-First Marketing

A global survey of marketers shows engaging customers in real time is a top challenge, but 76% of marketers agree Slack has improved their ability to make quick decisions1. Together, Salesforce and Slack give marketing teams and agency partners a shared digital workspace, and with today’s innovations, marketers can collaborate on customer journeys and get insights fast.

  • Intelligent, AI-driven insights from Marketing Cloud and Datorama – such as engagement being lower than expected – are shared directly in Slack, ensuring teams can take action fast to ensure campaigns stay on track. 
  • Workflow notifications automatically update Slack channels when changes to a marketing journey (i.e. a new email headline) are made, giving teams the ability to review, collaborate on and approve changes instantly.
With Slack-First Marketing, teams can view insights and changes to marketing journeys to review and take action on quickly.

Put data at the center of every conversation with Slack-First Analytics

Tableau and Slack expand the visibility of analytics across the organization and enable customers to stay on top of data from anywhere. Today’s new innovations help people access data-driven Tableau insights in Slack so they can make smarter decisions fast.

  • Automated notifications in Slack help users stay connected to Tableau data they need to act on, such as when a sales pipeline dips below a specified threshold.
  • Watchlist digests provide a daily update on selected metrics and trends, while Subscriptions automate dashboard updates in team channels, giving business users access to data and insights in the location where they’re already working. 
With Slack-First Analytics, automated notifications in Slack help users stay connected to Tableau activities and data they need to act on.

How customers collaborate with Salesforce and Slack

Leading companies are turning to Salesforce and Slack to build their digital HQs:

  • IBM: “The hybrid workplace requires the right digital tools to keep customers and employees connected, productive, and engaged,” said Arvind Krishna, Chairman and CEO of IBM. “The combined power of Salesforce and Slack is helping IBM deliver more value across every customer and employee interaction.”
  • Sonos: “In our rapid shift to an all-digital world, we learned we must be more connected, productive, and innovative to best reach and serve customers no matter where they are,” said Patrick Spence, CEO of Sonos. “The one-two punch of Salesforce and Slack has been crucial for collaboration between distributed teams, ultimately helping us achieve unprecedented growth during challenging times.”

“The one-two punch of Salesforce and Slack has been crucial for collaboration between distributed teams, ultimately helping us achieve unprecedented growth during challenging times.”

Patrick Spence, CEO, Sonos

How Salesforce partners drive Slack-First strategies 

Partners are crucial to extending the power of both Salesforce and Slack to customers worldwide. Salesforce Global Strategic partners Accenture, Deloitte and IBM, as well as consulting partners Silverline, Slalom, and Traction on Demand are investing in Slack across their businesses and practices, and certifying consultants to deliver Slack-First digital transformations for customers. In addition, ISV partners such as DocuSign and Vidyard offer Salesforce-based apps that already integrate seamlessly with Slack, powering connected experiences and workflows across the Slack-First Customer 360.

More Information

  • Learn more about Slack-First Customer 360 here
  • Learn more about how Salesforce and Slack are committed to giving back here
  • Read more about the vision for Salesforce and Slack from the product person leading the charge here

Availability

  • Slack-First Sales, Service andMarketing capabilities will be available in pilot in fall 2021. 
  • Slack-First Analytics is expected to be generally available in fall 2021.
  • Intelligent and Collaborative Insights from Datorama is generally available today.


About Salesforce

Salesforce, the global CRM leader, empowers companies of every size and industry to digitally transform and create a 360° view of their customers. For more information about Salesforce (NYSE: CRM), visit: www.salesforce.com.

This communication contains forward-looking information related to Salesforce, Slack and the acquisition of Slack by Salesforce that involves substantial risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied by such statements. Forward-looking statements relate to, among other things, future events and anticipated results of operations, business strategies, the anticipated benefits of the transaction, the anticipated impact of the transaction on the combined company’s business and financial and operating results, the expected amount and timing of synergies from the transaction, and other aspects of Salesforce’s operations or operating results. Risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to: the impact of public health crises, such as pandemics (including coronavirus (COVID-19)) and epidemics and any related company or government policies and actions to protect the health and safety of individuals or government policies or actions to maintain the functioning of national or global economies and markets; the effect of the transaction on the ability of Salesforce or Slack to retain and hire key personnel and maintain relationships with customers, suppliers and others with whom Salesforce or Slack do business, or on Salesforce’s or Slack’s operating results and business generally; Salesforce’s ability to successfully integrate Slack’s operations and realize expected synergies; the impact of, and actions Salesforce may take in response to, the COVID-19 pandemic, related public health measures and resulting economic downturn and market volatility; Salesforce’s ability to maintain security levels and service performance meeting the expectations of its customers, and the resources and costs required to avoid unanticipated downtime and prevent, detect and remediate performance degradation and security breaches; the expenses associated with Salesforce’s data centers and third-party infrastructure providers; Salesforce’s ability to secure additional data center capacity; Salesforce’s reliance on third-party hardware, software and platform providers; the effect of evolving domestic and foreign government regulations, including those related to the provision of services on the Internet, those related to accessing the Internet, and those addressing data privacy, cross-border data transfers and import and export controls; current and potential litigation involving Salesforce or its industry, including litigation involving acquired entities, and the resolution or settlement thereof; regulatory developments and regulatory investigations involving Salesforce or affecting its industry; Salesforce’s ability to successfully introduce new services and product features, including any efforts to expand its services; the success of Salesforce’s strategy of acquiring or making investments in complementary businesses, joint ventures, services, technologies and intellectual property rights; Salesforce’s ability to complete, on a timely basis or at all, announced transactions; Salesforce’s ability to realize the benefits from acquisitions, strategic partnerships, joint ventures and investments; Salesforce’s ability to successfully integrate acquired businesses and technologies; Salesforce’s ability to compete in the market in which it participates; the success of Salesforce’s business strategy and its plan to build its business, including its strategy to be a leading provider of enterprise cloud computing applications and platforms; Salesforce’s ability to execute its business plans; Salesforce’s ability to continue to grow unearned revenue and remaining performance obligation; the pace of change and innovation in enterprise cloud computing services; the seasonal nature of Salesforce’s sales cycles; Salesforce’s ability to limit customer attrition and costs related to those efforts; the success of Salesforce’s international expansion strategy; the demands on Salesforce’s personnel and infrastructure resulting from significant growth in its customer base and operations, including as a result of acquisitions; Salesforce’s ability to preserve its workplace culture, including as a result of its decisions regarding its current and future office environments or work-from-home policies; Salesforce’s dependency on the development and maintenance of the infrastructure of the Internet; Salesforce’s real estate and office facilities strategy and related costs and uncertainties; fluctuations in, and its ability to predict, its operating results and cash flows; the variability in Salesforce’s results arising from the accounting for term license revenue products; the performance and fair value of Salesforce’s investments in complementary businesses through its strategic investment portfolio; the impact of future gains or losses from Salesforce’s strategic investment portfolio, including gains or losses from overall market conditions that may affect the publicly traded companies within its strategic investment portfolio; Salesforce’s ability to protect its intellectual property rights; Salesforce’s ability to develop its brands; the impact of foreign currency exchange rate and interest rate fluctuations on its results; the valuation of its deferred tax assets and the release of related valuation allowances; the potential availability of additional tax assets in the future; the impact of new accounting pronouncements and tax laws; uncertainties affecting Salesforce’s ability to estimate its tax rate; uncertainties regarding Salesforce’s tax obligations in connection with potential jurisdictional transfers of intellectual property, including the tax rate, the timing of the transfer and the value of such transferred intellectual property; uncertainties regarding the effect of general economic and market conditions; the impact of geopolitical events; uncertainties regarding the impact of expensing stock options and other equity awards; the sufficiency of Salesforce’s capital resources; Salesforce’s ability to comply with its debt covenants and lease obligations; and the impact of climate change, natural disasters and actual or threatened public health emergencies, including the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

Further information on these and other risks and uncertainties relating to Salesforce can be found in its reports filed on Forms 10-K, 10-Q and 8-K and in other filings Salesforce makes with the Securities and Exchange Commission from time to time and available at www.sec.gov. These documents are also available under the Financials heading of the Investor Relations section of Salesforce’s website at www.salesforce.com/investor. The forward-looking statements included in this communication are made only as of the date hereof. Salesforce undertakes no obligation to update any forward-looking statements to reflect subsequent events or circumstances, except as required by law.

Any unreleased services or features referenced in this or other press releases or public statements are not currently available and may not be delivered on time or at all. Customers who purchase Salesforce applications should make their purchase decisions based upon features that are currently available. Salesforce has headquarters in San Francisco, with offices in Europe and Asia, and trades on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol "CRM." For more information please visit https://www.salesforce.com, or call 1-800-NO-SOFTWARE.

 

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