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Apple Messages for Business in Service Cloud allows customers to get AI-assisted support, schedule appointments, complete purchases, and more

Apple’s ARKit in the Salesforce Field Service mobile app brings augmented reality capabilities to field technicians, helping them resolve service issues more efficiently

Today, Salesforce announced an expansion of its partnership with Apple to bring Apple innovations into Service Cloud and Field Service for customers, service agents, and field technicians.

“We’re thrilled to deepen our partnership with Apple, further integrating the world’s #1 AI CRM with Apple’s incredible business devices and apps,” said Ryan Nichols, Chief Product Officer of Service Cloud, Salesforce. “These features are helping companies implement cutting-edge technology and augmented reality in a practical way, improving every interaction a company has with its customers.”

Why it matters:

• There are over 2 billion active Apple devices in the world, and over half of the American population uses iPhones.
• Messaging — including chat, email, and text messages — is the preferred customer service channel among consumers ages 18-34, and over 50% of app users are more likely to interact with a business if they can message it.

What’s new:

• Apple Messages for Business in Service Cloud gives customers the ability to easily connect with customer support, get personalized shopping recommendations, schedule appointments, complete purchases with Apple Pay, track shipments, and more‌ — ‌all within the Messages app. Agents can efficiently manage these conversations in Service Cloud and access customer data for fast resolution. For example, a retail customer can chat directly with a business for personalized, AI-driven product recommendations and to inquire about sizing, inventory status, returns, and more. Unlike live chat experiences, the chat session will continue even if the customer navigates away and then returns.
• Apple’s ARKit enables field service teams with augmented reality capabilities within the Salesforce Field Service Mobile App. With the ARKit, field technicians can easily create detailed 3D renderings of large areas, measure spaces, and map objects using simple image capture — streamlining processes and marking a technological shift in the field service industry. For example, a technician can plan an installation space to ensure a new refrigerator fits through the door and can be installed without any issues, increasing the efficiency and success of installation services.
• The Salesforce Field Service iOS widget gives field service technicians a quick view of key account information such as upcoming appointments, work order details, and directions to their worksite directly on their iPhone home screen, saving them clicks and valuable time.

What they’re saying:

• “We are excited to explore the new augmented reality capabilities in the Salesforce Field Service Mobile App. Throughout Pella’s nearly 99-year history, we’ve embraced powerful new tools that have enabled installers to enhance their service delivery. With AR capabilities built into the Salesforce Field Service App, installers will be able to visualize and complete their work faster and safer, helping us deliver on our mission of providing customers access to the latest innovation and a world-class service experience.” – Emily Stroup, Strategic Implementation Manager, Pella
• “Customers want seamless and painless interactions with service agents and field technicians. Technology is key to delivering on both ends, from reaching customers where they are and on their preferred communications platforms, to leveraging capabilities like augmented reality to complete onsite work faster and safer. By further integrating Apple’s business software into Service Cloud and Field Service, Salesforce is providing businesses with the technology and capabilities needed to deliver high-quality customer service and satisfaction.” – Mary Wardley, VP of Customer Service and Contact Center Applications, IDC

Zoom out: Today’s news builds on Apple and Salesforce’s ongoing relationship.

• The companies first announced their strategic partnership at Dreamforce 2018, enabling Salesforce to redesign its app for a native mobile platform with exclusive features on iOS.
• Since then, the partners have provided tools and resources for millions of Salesforce developers to build native apps with a new Salesforce Mobile SDK for iOS and launched an iOS app development course on Trailhead, Salesforce’s free online learning platform.

Availability:

• Apple Messages for Business in Service Cloud is generally available today with Service Cloud Digital Engagement.
• ARKit will be available in the Salesforce Field Service Mobile app in the summer of 2024.
• The Salesforce Field Service iOS widget will be available in the summer of 2024.

Now Salesforce announced an expansion of its partnership with Apple to bring Apple innovations into Service Cloud and Field Service for customers, service agents, and field technicians.

“We’re thrilled to deepen our partnership with Apple, further integrating the world’s #1 AI CRM with Apple’s incredible business devices and apps,” says Ryan Nichols, chief product officer of Service Cloud, Salesforce, in a press release. “These features are helping companies implement cutting-edge technology and augmented reality in a practical way, improving every interaction a company has with its customers.”

Here are the reasons he says it matters:

And are the things that are new in the expanded Apple/Salesforce partnership, according to Nichols:

• Apple Messages for Business in Service Cloud gives customers the ability to easily connect with customer support, get personalized shopping recommendations, schedule appointments, complete purchases with Apple Pay, track shipments, and more—all within the Messages app. Agents can efficiently manage these conversations in Service Cloud and access customer data for fast resolution. For example, a retail customer can chat directly with a business for personalized, AI-driven product recommendations and to inquire about sizing, inventory status, returns, and more. Unlike live chat experiences, the chat session will continue even if the customer navigates away and then returns.
• Apple’s ARKit enables field service teams with augmented reality capabilities within the Salesforce Field Service Mobile App. With the ARKit, field technicians can easily create detailed 3D renderings of large areas, measure spaces, and map objects using simple image capture — streamlining processes and marking a technological shift in the field service industry. For example, a technician can plan an installation space to ensure a new refrigerator fits through the door and can be installed without any issues, increasing the efficiency and success of installation services.
• The Salesforce Field Service iOS widget gives field service technicians a quick view of key account information such as upcoming appointments, work order details, and directions to their worksite directly on their iPhone home screen, saving them clicks and valuable time.

Apple and Salesforce first announced their strategic partnership at Dreamforce 2018, enabling Salesforce to redesign its app for a native mobile platform with exclusive features on iOS. Since then, the partners have provided tools and resources for millions of Salesforce developers to build native apps with a new Salesforce Mobile SDK [software development kit] for iOS and launched an iOS app development course on Trailhead, Salesforce’s free online learning platform, according to Nichols.

Apple Messages for Business in Service Cloud is generally available today with Service Cloud Digital Engagement. ARKit will be available in the Salesforce Field Service Mobile app in the summer of 2024. The Salesforce Field Service iOS widget will be available in the summer of 2024.

Article provided with permission from AppleWorld.Today

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Salesforce blends powerful built-in capabilities with the flexibility to create your own low-code capabilities. But as any seasoned developer will tell you, building applications is the easy part. The real challenge is ensuring they don’t break over time and having robust protections in place to allow you to continue to build – and experiment – without fear of failure.

This is why testing, especially automated testing, is so important. Testing is a key aspect of achieving digital transformation. No matter the size of the company, if teams aren’t emphasizing testing, they won’t achieve the speed and reliability of changes they need.

Interested in knowing more about how teams are managing their testing processes, Copado surveyed more than 275 Salesforce professionals, who shared details of their teams’ strengths and weaknesses on testing. Here are a few big takeaways:

• 41% of teams don’t have time to test every change before each release.
• 92% experience production issues due to inadequate testing.
• 84% still rely at least partially on manual testing.
• 51% of organizations have 25+ full-time QA resources (20% have 100+ resources).
• 95% have a higher total cost of ownership for manual testing versus commercial test automation.

Also see: Digital Transformation Guide: Definition, Types & Strategy

Common Testing Challenges

Testing needs to happen at many levels, from unit tests to cross-system UI testing. Salesforce unit tests are helpful, but the unit testing culture among Salesforce developers is far weaker than in other languages like Ruby.

Salesforce mandates 75% unit test code coverage to deploy to production, but because continuous integration wasn’t common on Salesforce until recently, most Salesforce developers don’t fully appreciate the importance of these tests. So, it’s common to see sloppy tests that meet the 75% threshold but provide little or no actual protection.

UI testing is also tricky on Salesforce, especially on their newer UI, Lightning. Lightning uses a shadow DOM (document object model) for security and performance purposes, but that makes it hard for tools like Selenium that rely on the DOM.

The underlying DOM is also subject to change without warning, which can make tests fail even if the actual system is working properly. This means that UI testing tools for Salesforce need to have significant intelligence built-in.

Salesforce is also frequently integrated with other systems like ServiceNow, SAP, and Oracle Financials. This means that testing tools need to be able to test all of the connected systems to ensure end-to-end functionality.

As a low-code platform, Salesforce development can move quite quickly. The underlying Salesforce platform is also updated three times a year. These faster software cycles mean more changes and updates that cause unwelcome surprises down the road if you don’t have good tests in place.

System behavior can also depend on the underlying data in the system. So test data management is important, especially when working with complex apps built on top of Salesforce like Salesforce CPQ, Veeva, and nCino.

Lastly, Salesforce is designed to give low coders a boost. This means that ideally, testing tools should be easy for non-coders to use also.

Also see: DevOps, Low-Code and RPA:  Pros and Cons 

A Few Trends in Salesforce Testing

As Salesforce matures in scope and sophistication, organizations need to be ready for high-quality, cross-cloud customizations and verify third-party integrations across other technologies and platforms.

Teams in our survey (41%) said they don’t have enough time to sufficiently test all changes before a release. Our analysis shows that teams feel pressure to deliver features because of aggressive project timelines and that development takes longer than expected.

Testing, ultimately, gets thrown on the backburner as a result. Teams often fail to give testing the respect it deserves, and relegate it to the end of a sprint, rather than following test-driven development or other methods of shifting quality left.

Also see: What Does 2022 Hold for Intelligent Automation

Low Code Testing in Early Stages

Low-code platforms like Salesforce will continue to dominate the digital landscape as every business migrates its infrastructure to the cloud. The speed and ease of building on these platforms is unmatched, but they require robust testing to make sure changes don’t break existing systems.

Low-code platforms remain in the early stages of testing. Based on Salesforce’s research on its professionals, the majority of teams still mainly rely on manual efforts. But the rise of DevOps and the acceleration of change means that automated testing is the next frontier for today’s digital businesses.

About the Author: 

Andrew Davis, Salesforce DevOps Specialist and Senior Director of Research and Innovation, Copado.

Why is Salesforce expensive?

As part of the Salesforce subscription, a limited amount of storage is provided. There are complex limitations on storage, and many organizations will need to increase their storage, which will result in higher costs.

How many small businesses use Salesforce?

Small businesses will be convinced to throw out their spreadsheets and switch to a platform relied on by 83 percent of Fortune 500 companies by using Salesforce Essentials. The small business community shouldn't be disadvantaged any longer.

Can small companies afford Salesforce?

Salesforce Essentials is a low-cost option. Salesforce Essentials CRM is available for $25 per user/month for businesses with five or fewer employees. The cost of moving more employees over to SF CRM is $75/user/month, a price that many small businesses are willing to pay.

Can small businesses use Salesforce?

Small businesses make up a large portion of Salesforce's customer base. Salesforce started out as a small business that catered to the needs of other businesses. Some of the world's most recognizable brands rely on Salesforce, but many of its clients are small businesses and startups.

How much do companies spend on Salesforce?

ProfessionalSalesforce Sales CloudSalesforce Service CloudSalesforce Marketing Cloud$25 per user, per mo$25 per user, per mo$400 per mo$75 per user, per mo$75 per user, per mo$1,250 per mo$150 per user, per mo$150 per user, per mo$3,750 per mo

Is Salesforce affordable for small business?

For many small businesses, the Salesforce small business edition is a cost-effective solution. Annual plans cost $25 per month per user, with month-to-month plans costing a little more. It enables smaller businesses to function in the same way as larger corporations without incurring the costs of an enterprise-level solution.

What is the cheapest Salesforce license?

Can you tell me where I can get a cheap t Salesforce license? Salesforce's Sales Cloud and Service Cloud each cost $25 per user per month, making them the cheapest Salesforce licenses.

Is there a free version of Salesforce?

The CRM software provided by Salesforce does not have a free version, so it has three pricing plans users must choose from.

What percentage of companies use Salesforce?

The Salesforce platform is used by over 150,000 companies. The revenue from Salesforce was 21. In the fiscal year 2021, the budget will be $25 billion. Salesforce is ranked number 19 in the world. a market share of CRM of 8 of the CRM market of 8 of the%

What top companies use Salesforce?

• Spotify.
• Web services offered by Amazon.
• It is nationalized by the USA bank.
• Toyota.
• Macy's.
• T-Mobile.
• Aldo.
• I read The New York Post daily.

Who are Salesforce biggest clients?

Walmart Inc. is among the companies that use Salesforce CRM for Customer Relationship Management. With 2200000 employees and $559 million in revenue, is a retail company based in the United States. UnitedHealth Group Incorporated, a healthcare company based in the United States with 330000 employees and $255 billion in revenue, has a market capitalization of $15 billion. 64 .

What company did Salesforce buy?

In August 2019, Salesforce completed the acquisition of Tableau Software, bringing together the #1 CRM in the world with the #1 analytics platform in the world.

Is Salesforce expensive?

Salesforce isn't overly expensive when compared to other top CRM providers, but it's also not dirt cheap. Salesforce is about average for the industry, with prices ranging from $25 per user per month to $300 per user per month, depending on the plan.

Why Salesforce is bad?

The Bad. It is expensive to use Salesforce as a comparison to other products, and small businesses will experience this the most. Too much for small teams and businesses: Smaller teams and businesses that don't require all of Salesforce's features may find the software to be overwhelming or too large to fully utilize.

Is Salesforce actually good?

The Salesforce CRM software finishes as our No. 1 pick for our Best CRM Software of 2021 list. CRM is a well known product on the market, so it makes sense that many customers, particularly those in large businesses, are attracted to it. It's best for companies that are willing to put in the effort and spend the money to get the most out of their CRM software.

Can small businesses use Salesforce?

For small businesses, Salesforce is an excellent platform for managing existing customers. With the tools provided by Salesforce, finding new customers is easy. Salesforce makes it easy for marketers to manage online and social media marketing. In addition to managing sales, Salesforce also aids small businesses with customer support.

What size companies use Salesforce?

The sales force. Companies with 10-50 employees and a revenue of $1 million to $10 million are the most common users of com CRM.

Do a lot of companies use Salesforce?

According to reports, Salesforce's software was used by 150,000 companies as of 2017, including Amazon (AMZN) - Get Amazon. com, Inc. Automatic Data Processing, Inc. Report: Adidas (ADDYY) , ADP (ADP) - Get The Latest News. The American Express Company Report - Get all the details for American Express (AXP).

How much is Salesforce per month for a small business?

Salesforce Essentials lets you grow revenue, engage leads, and provide outstanding service - all from one platform - for just $25 per month*.

How much does Salesforce cost for a business?

Name	Price
Sales Essentials Edition	$25/user/month*
Professional Edition	$75/user/month*
Enterprise Edition	$150/user/month*
Unlimited Edition	$300/user/month*

How much do companies pay for Salesforce?

		Professional
Salesforce Sales Cloud	Salesforce Service Cloud	Salesforce Marketing Cloud
$25 per user, per mo	$25 per user, per mo	$400 per mo
$75 per user, per mo	$75 per user, per mo	$1,250 per mo
$150 per user, per mo	$150 per user, per mo	$3,750 per mo

How many small businesses use Salesforce?

Over 150,000 Salesforce customers thrive on our secure, scalable cloud platform, ranging from small businesses to FORTUNE 500** companies.

How many organizations use Salesforce?

Its cloud-based solutions are used by more than 150,000 organizations worldwide.

Is Salesforce for large companies?

Salesforce is a secure, scalable cloud platform used by 150,000 companies ranging from small corporations to FORTUNE 500** entities. We're the leading enterprise software company when it comes to managing customer relationships, because we do this well.

LONDON — L’Occitane has made its first acquisition of the year, buying the Italian home fragrance brand Dr. Vranjes Firenze from Bluegem Capital Partners in deal valued at about 150 million euros.

The completion of the transaction is expected at the end of the first quarter.

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L’Occitane, a French company listed on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange, will add Dr. Vranjes to a portfolio that includes Melvita, Erborian, Elemis, Sol de Janeiro and Grown Alchemist.

Bluegem purchased its majority stake in Dr. Vranjes six years ago, and said it helped the company triple sales to more than 42 million euros in 2023, with an EBITDA margin exceeding 30 percent.

Growth came from a beefed-up international sales effort across 28 exclusive stores and 650 retail points, and expansion into new markets, including the Middle East and Asia.

Bluegem also worked with Dr. Vranjes management to launch new product lines, including personal fragrances and scented candles.

Emilio Di Spiezio Sardo, Bluegem founding partner, said: “We extend our deepest gratitude to Dr. Paolo Vranjes for his visionary leadership, innovative spirit and invaluable partnership.”

Constantin Rojahn, Bluegem investment director, said “the dedication and expertise of the management team led by CEO Giuseppe Colotto have been fundamental to the brand’s ongoing progress, and will remain crucial as it continues to evolve.

“We would like to extend our appreciation to board director Massimo Saracchi for his significant contributions to the brand’s development,” he said.

Dr. Paolo Vranjes launched the collection in 1983, with a focus on luxury home scents and products such as diffusers.

In a separate interview, Rojahn said the launch of personal fragrance, as well as international expansion, helped to supercharge growth.

Story continues

“Dr. Vranjes is now a global business that’s strong in Europe, the U.S., the Middle East, Japan and China. The customer is a discerning one, and we launched the fragrance in response to their requests,” he said.

There are six eau de parfums on offer with names such as Rosa Tabacco, Ginger Lime and Peonia Black Jasmine. They retail for 139 pounds for a 100ml bottle, according to the brand’s website. There is also a body care line, with a scented lotion, powder, body and hair mist.

Rojahn added that Bluegem would continue to invest in beauty and fragrance. “Personal fragrance in particular is a very dynamic market, and we’ve seen the industry shift its focus to niche, fine fragrances.”

The high-end luxury fragrance segment is a hot commodity these days, and among the fastest growing in beauty. It’s been registering double-digit growth, plus high profitability and revenue recurrence.

Last summer the newly formed Kering Beauté purchased the historic fragrance house Creed. Its plan is to use Creed, a highly profitable, 300 million euro business, as a platform and accelerator for its burgeoning beauty division.

Bluegem is a European specialist private equity firm investing in consumer staple businesses. The company said it focuses on six distinct consumer segments including beauty, personal and home care, food and beverage and health and wellbeing.

It is the former owner of Liberty in London and Jack Wills. In 2020, as reported, it took a stake in Panzeri Diffusion, now known as Beautynova, an Italian company trading in the professional hair care category. It also has stakes in the skin care and makeup brands QMS Medicosmetics and Iconic London.

Advisers on the deal included Lempriere Wells, Rothschild & Co. and Deloitte.

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