Salesforce business analytics tools allow you to explore the whys and hows of organizational performance. However, as your business grows, the scope and volume of your data will grow along with it. In turn, you are bound to encounter some challenges when it comes to analytics.
The good news is that Salesforce is more than capable of helping you overcome these hurdles. Before you can do that, you’ll need to familiarize yourself with the most common challenges in Salesforce business analytics and how to solve them. Those challenges include the following:
Challenge 1: Managing Data Quality
Problem: Incomplete, Duplicate, or Outdated Data Impacting Analytics Accuracy
Solution
The success of your Salesforce business analytics efforts hinges on the quality of your data. The phrase “garbage in, garbage out” is popular among analysts for a good reason- Even the most powerful tools can’t deliver accurate insights if the underlying data is flawed.
Starting with high-quality, reliable data is essential to producing analytics reports you can trust. But over time, Salesforce data can become incomplete or cluttered with duplicate records, compromising the accuracy of your insights.
To maintain data integrity, follow these best practices:
- Conduct regular data audits and implement ongoing cleansing processes to get rid of incomplete or duplicate files
- Leverage Salesforce’s Duplicate Management tools to identify and merge duplicate entries, reducing clutter.
- Create custom retention policies using data archiving tools like Own Archive to manage outdated information.
The bottom line: your reports are only as good as the data they are built on. To ensure reliable insights, you need timely, relevant information in your Salesforce database. Aim for a dataset that’s broad enough to produce meaningful results, but clean enough to avoid skewed analytics from duplicate or incomplete records.
By using the right tools and maintaining a clean database, you’ll generate more accurate, actionable reports that guide decision-making.
Challenge 2: Handling Large Volumes of Data
Problem: Performance Issues and Difficulty in Analyzing Large Datasets
Solution
One of the biggest hurdles in effective Salesforce business analytics is information overload. Analyzing large datasets can become cumbersome and may even impact system performance, making it harder to extract meaningful insights. To maintain efficiency, consider these tactics:
- Use data filters and custom reports to narrow down datasets and focus on the most relevant information
- Archive historical data to external systems so you can reduce the strain on your Salesforce instance and improve performance.
- Take advantage of Salesforce Big Objects to manage massive datasets while keeping critical information easily accessible.
Salesforce offers several tools designed to help you handle large datasets. The key is understanding their capabilities and deploying them in ways that support your specific Salesforce business analytics needs.
To maximize your insights, use a mix of broad reports and focused analytics techniques. Large-scale reports can give you a glimpse of the big picture, while custom reports go deeper to reveal the “hows” and “whys” behind business performance.
Challenge 3: Accessing Historical Trend Data to Respond to Requests From the Business
Problem: Limited Access to Long-Term Historical Data, With Salesforce’s Trend Reporting Only Going Back Three Months
Solution
Native Salesforce tools provide only limited access to historical data. While the platform’s three-month lookback window supports most analytics processes, some business requests require insights that go beyond this timeframe.
To address those requests and conduct long-term trend analysis, you need an effective way to capture, retain and analyze historical information. You can build on the valuable insights offered by Salesforce trend reporting by taking two key steps.
- Leverage tools like Own Discover to capture, retain, and analyze long-term trend data, enabling you to analyze performance over extended periods.
- Regularly evaluate historical trends to proactively identify patterns, helping you address business inquiries with actionable insights.
Access to extended historical data empowers your business to make more informed decisions and respond swiftly to requests for insights. You can obtain granular reports to better understand specific business challenges or look at overall organizational performance.
For example, a tool like Discover would enable you to analyze Q1 of 2024 performance data and set realistic targets for Q1 2025. This deeper understanding of historical trends helps your business identify strengths, address weaknesses, and uncover areas for improvement.
Challenge 4: Security and Compliance Concerns
Problem: Sensitive Data Requires Stringent Security Measures, Which Complicates Analytics Workflows
Solution
Salesforce business analytics relies on vast amounts of data. That data needs to be both accessible and secure. However, balancing these two seemingly opposing objectives can complicate your analytics workflows.
To simplify your processes while ensuring security and compliance, consider the following best practices You can do that by:
- Implement Salesforce Shield for advanced encryption, event monitoring, and field audit trail capabilities to enhance data protection.
- Use role-based permissions to control access to sensitive reports and dashboards, ensuring that only authorized personnel can view or modify data.
- Back up your data regularly to safeguard against data loss and maintain compliance with organizational policies.
Your business’s reputation hinges on its ability to protect the data it collects. Conversely, your organization’s success will largely depend on how well you leverage that data to make informed decisions and capitalize on market opportunities.
Solutions like Salesforce Shield help you strike the ideal balance, empowering you to build trust, maintain compliance, and drive value from your analytics processes.
Unlock the Full Potential of Salesforce Analytics With Own
With Archive to manage data volumes and Discover to uncover trends from your entire CRM, Own from Salesforce can take your business analytics journey to the next level.
Schedule a demo with us to learn more.
