When we talk about CRMs or portals the first thing which comes to our mind is Salesforce. They are and have been ruling the industry for more than a decade now. The reason for their success is that they understand their market deeply and have been known to launch products that complement their CRM creating a perfect flow for customer communication for their clients.
The complimentary products that we are talking about here are portals and communities. If you’ve been following Salesforce or have been using it for a long time now, then you might be aware of what they are, their functionalities, and how they benefit organizations.
In this blog, we are going to discuss:
- Types of Salesforce portals and their functionalities
- Salesforce communities and Salesforce community portal examples
- Difference between Salesforce Portals and Communities
- Which one to choose?
Today almost every organization we interact with is through Portals. Believe it or not, it’s true.
These portals have taken up the market and revolutionized the ways people interact with companies and vice versa. According to research done by Nuance, 67% of people prefer to use self-service portals instead of getting on a call or emailing with company employees.
Portals not only changed the way users interact with the companies but they also gave users a chance to learn and explore things on their own.
And these portals are not limited to customer interactions. They go beyond.
Three major types of Salesforce portals:
1. Self-service portal:
Nowadays customers prefer to solve their problems, even the technical ones on their own. Self-service portals help them by redirecting them to the right FAQs, blog posts, technical documents, videos, etc. so that they can resolve the issue on their own. This reduces the communication between your customers and customer support while creating a win-win situation for both. Your support can work more productively and customers don’t need to wait to get their answers.
2. Customer portal:
Salesforce.com Customer Portal provides customers with an online channel to communicate with customer executives and solve their issues. They help to streamline communication and provide easy and fast solutions. Portals are also helping companies to provide 24/7 support to their customers regardless of time zones and geographic shortcomings.
Their customer portal is somewhat similar to the self-service portal except that you’ll be providing your customers with a different interface to interact with you rather than doing it directly from your website or web app.
3. Partner portal:
Salesforce partner portal is for your sales and channel partners. They have access to the core features of Salesforce CRM. The partner portal also provides partners with leads and customer conversion opportunities.
Features of Salesforce Customer Portal
Seamless Integration for Enhanced Support
The Salesforce Customer Portal seamlessly connects with your CRM system, providing a comprehensive view of customer information. This integration empowers support teams to deliver more effective and personalized assistance.
Collaboration and Innovation
Through the Salesforce Ideas platform, accessible via the Customer Portal, customers can actively participate in shaping the platform’s future. By sharing insights and suggestions, customers contribute to improving problem-solving and overall user experience for the entire community.
Self-Service for Customers
The Customer Portal offers self-service capabilities through features like Salesforce Knowledge, Solutions, and Answers. Customers can quickly find resolutions to common issues, reducing case volume and improving overall satisfaction.
Customized Customer Experience
Create tailored experiences for customers by building custom profiles with unique layouts, views, and security settings. This level of personalization enhances customer engagement and satisfaction.
Data-Driven Insights
Utilize the power of reporting and analytics to track customer interactions, identify trends, and measure the performance of support efforts. These insights inform data-driven decisions to optimize customer service operations.
Portal is a neat way to communicate with different entities associated with your business. But, this is not all where Salesforce stopped. They wanted to make portals more branded, collaborative, and bring a change in the way users and companies interact with each other.
Hence in 2013, Salesforce introduced Community Cloud with an aim to share information and collaborate with people more effectively. It provides companies with the tools to create online communities by connecting with customers, external partners, and employees.
Different Tiers of Salesforce Community Cloud
1. Customer Community
The Customer Community tier is designed to provide basic access for external customers. It enables companies to create self-service portals where customers can find answers to their queries, submit support cases, and access a knowledge base. Key features include:
- Case Management: Customers can create and track support cases, ensuring timely resolution of their issues.
- Knowledge Base: Access to articles, FAQs, and other resources to help customers find solutions independently.
- Community Engagement: Customers can interact with each other, share insights, and provide peer-to-peer support.
This tier is ideal for organizations looking to enhance customer service and reduce support costs by enabling customers to find answers and resolve issues on their own.
2. Customer Community Plus
The Customer Community Plus tier builds on the basic functionalities of the Customer Community, offering advanced features for more comprehensive customer interactions. It is suitable for organizations that require deeper engagement and enhanced reporting capabilities. Key features include:
- Advanced Sharing: More granular control over data sharing, ensuring that the right information is accessible to the right users.
- Reports and Dashboards: Enhanced reporting tools allow customers to generate and view personalized reports and dashboards.
- Extended Access: Customers can access additional objects and data, providing a richer experience and more extensive interactions with the community.
This tier is perfect for companies that need to provide customers with more detailed information and reporting capabilities. It builds a deeper connection and more proactive customer service.
3. Partner Community
The Partner Community tier is specifically designed for business partners who require extensive collaboration and access to business-critical information. It includes all the features of the Customer Community Plus, along with additional tools tailored for partners. Key features include:
- Lead Distribution and Management: Partners can receive, manage, and track leads, helping to drive sales and business growth.
- Opportunity Management: Partners can manage opportunities, track progress, and collaborate with the internal sales team to close deals.
- Collaboration Tools: Enhanced tools for communication and collaboration, including shared calendars, document management, and task assignments.
This tier is ideal for organizations that rely on a network of business partners for sales and distribution. It enables seamless collaboration, efficient lead and opportunity management, and comprehensive support for partner relationships.
Community clouds are taking over the market due to its high scalability, no coding requirements, libraries filled with rich scalable templates, easy third party integrations, and custom made components, and more.
You can build communities based on the entities you interact with for different purposes. The popular Salesforce community portal examples are Hulu Help, Trailblazer community, CEAT support, AirAsia customer support, and BigCommerce support.
Difference Between Salesforce Customer Portal and Communities
Portals and community clouds have the same structural features but differ in the way people interact with them.
| Feature | Community Cloud | Portal |
|---|---|---|
| Customization | Highly customizable interface, branding, and user experience | Limited customization options for appearance and branding |
| Communication | Emphasizes collaboration through forums, groups, and social features | Primarily focused on transactional interactions like |
| Content Management | Advanced content management with robust organization and version control | Basic content management with limited organization tools |
| Pricing | Often included in Salesforce licenses or offered at lower costs | Typically requires additional licensing and higher costs per user |
| Accessibility | Optimized for mobile devices with a responsive design | Limited mobile optimization, with some features accessible on mobile |
| Integration | Seamlessly integrates with Salesforce and other systems, enabling extensive data sharing | Primarily integrates with Salesforce, with limited data sharing capabilities |
| Functionality | Offers collaboration tools, self-service support, knowledge sharing, and idea generation | Focuses on case management, order tracking, and account management |
Community cloud comes with the integration of site.com for content management, android management and iOS version, integration of Salesforce Einstein, Chatter, enhanced security, and many more.
Now, comes the main question, what should you use: Salesforce Customer Portal or Communities?
Even today Salesforce portals are the most searched and most used products. But, over the course, they will soon be replaced with Community Cloud. So if you are a company using a customer portal for a few years now, then it might be time to start looking to switch to community cloud.
But if you are a company that’s just starting out or is just starting to scale then the Salesforce portal is the right option.
Portals and communities are the same in some ways and a lot different in others. The right decision lies with knowing your requirements, the stage your company’s at, and especially, what your customers expect from you.
About us:
CRMJetty is a hub of innovative customer relationship solutions. Our tools ensure that you can render enhanced interactions at each stage of your customer lifecycle. So, if you are searching for a right portal solution for your company, then you can choose from our wide range of solutions for Salesforce, Dynamics, and more. We have served in this industry for a decade and have built many Salesforce portals like customer portal, self-service portal, non-profit portals, etc. Get in touch with us and we’ll help you kick start your journey towards communicating better.
Check out to know about Salesforce Customer Portal Vs Partner Portal
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