Aundria Richard Technology

Executive Summary

An effective plan for entering, cleaning and updating the data for your salesforce.com (SFDC) system is critical for achieving success with SFDC. According to industry experts poor planning for managing the data entry/data quality issue has historically been one of the largest reasons for failure with CRM systems.

The data entry/data quality challenges faced by a SFDC customer, and the corresponding solutions and best practices to be considered will vary depending on the company sales process and size. However applying data management best practices can be instrumental for creating revenue growth and a competitive advantage with your SFDC investment.

Why Does Data Quality Matter for Salesforce.com Customers?
This whitepaper concentrates on the data impact and benefits to sales and marketing users selling to other businesses. Although SFDC is used by a variety of other company functions, such as service and support, this analysis focuses on the best practice recommendations for sales and marketing.

There are two main reasons why current stakeholders in a SFDC project should have a strategy for addressing the quality of data in their SFDC system.

1) Historical Lessons Learned from Prior CRM Project Failures:

There is a growing body of research from industry analysts that “data entry/data quality” is one the top, if not the top factor determining the success or failure for a CRM project.

CSO Insights, a research firm that specializes in benchmarking sales & marketing excellence, published its annual study of sales organizations worldwide on January 12, 2004. The 2004 Sales Excellence Report, which includes responses from over 1,300 sales executives, cited the number one challenge for CRM initiatives was populating systems with accurate data and then maintaining the accuracy of that information. Another research study from the company called, “Increasing Sales Effectiveness Through Optimized Sales Knowledge Management”, highlighted three key process improvements desired by the study participants tied to using technology for higher sales effectiveness.

• Dynamic Process. “Over half the organizations surveyed stated that their top improvement objective was to develop ways to manage sales knowledge delivery in a much more instantaneous, as-the-world-is-changing manner. Annual, quarterly, even monthly postings of information are not frequent enough to meet the needs of the rate of change in the marketplace.”

• Easier Access. “As noted in past studies, access to information still needs to be improved…In a perfect world there would be one place to go for knowledge, and while it might pull information from several sources, the linking would be transparent to the sales team member…”

Registry cleaner: ever heard of them? I’m sure you have heard of anti-virus programs or anti-spyware programs. But registry cleaner programs? Probably not as often.

These programs are critical to the healthy running of your PC. Every time your computer crashes, runs too slow, does not shut down properly, or cannot remove programs using the add/remove dialog, these are symptoms that your computer needs a registry cleaner to do a scan.

A good registry cleaner removes and/or corrects the unnecessary, corrupted, broken links to files and errors to DLL files to optimize your PC’s performance. It frees up the resources allocated to these files so that the resources can be used elsewhere. In my opinion, the performance of my computer is just as important as my computer not being infected by a virus. So it is definitely a good idea to invest in a good registry cleaner program.

Personally, I like to fix things around the house myself. But when it comes to fixing things on the computer, unless I know EXACTLY what I’m doing, I much rather pay a few dollars and let the experts handle the problem. My desktop and laptop computers have so much impact in my daily life, it is important that I keep them in optimal performance form for as long as possible. Registry cleaner programs help me achieve it.

It is a good idea to get a good registry cleaner program and run scans regularly before you notice the above-mentioned symptoms or just as the first of them appear. It is never a good sight to have the dreaded blue screen pop up as you are typing away on your computer. That’s exactly what happened to me two years ago, and I nearly lost all my data on my hard-drive (Believe me, it is a scary feeling trying to remember whether you backed up the data on a DVD or an external hard-drive). I still regret to this day on not having access to a registry cleaner up back then. Having proper pre-caution measures is key in preventing this from happening. A reliable program is one of these key measures.

I am not suggesting that these are the only questions that would be asked, but are some samples for consideration. These are questions that I have used when interviewing others:

1. How many test scripts can you write in a day?

I am looking here for the ability to estimate. Whilst in reality the question is impractical, because it depends on so many different factors, I want to see the interviewee come up with some kind of answer. When estimating, there is a need to make assumptions and having a ball park figure enables someone to provide rough estimates more quickly.

2. How many test scripts can you execute in a day?

This is a repetition of the first question. I normally ask one directly after the other. The more junior resources tend to struggle with the first question and then the second also. The better resources learn from the experience of the first question and respond in a more positive manner to the second. Now I am not only looking at the ability to estimate, but also the ability to learn and an indication of the resources chances of seniority going forward.

3. Do you see testing as a service or a discipline?

Personally I am quite passionate about this one. I very much see testing as a discipline and a part of the software life-cycle that is as important as analysis, design and development. What I am trying to understand is the background that the individual someone has come from. Consultancy can demand one or other mindset and someone coming from either background can adapt, but I would suggest it is easier to revert from discipline to service than vice versa.

4. What is the most interesting defect you have found?

This is a passion question. I am looking to see if the individual can recount a particular incident and in what degree of detail. This begins to tell me whether they are a career tester or someone who is doing a job.

5. What are the key components of a test script?

Music lovers have been carrying around radios and other
bulky music devices in order to take their tunes along with
them as they go from place to place. With the iPod – a
portable unit that’s manufactured by Apple – the music
experience offers a higher quality in a much more compact
size.

The iPod will allow your personal music selection to be
played for up to 12 hours at a time, and offers the
additional perks of games and the ability to store files.
Up to 5,000 songs can be stored within a standard iPod,
providing instant access from wherever you happen to be at
the moment. Whether you’re in the office, going for a
stroll, in the car or around the house, iPod is the
solution for your contemporary music needs.

Among the features of the iPod are the ability to choose a
specific play list, shuffle through songs and much more -
all with the click of a button. Users even have the option
of importing their favorite songs from CDs, and music can
be transferred in a variety of formats, such as MP3 or AAC.
If you opt for the FireWire and USB 2.0 support, you can
transfer music from a CD in less than five seconds.

The capability of the iPod also includes that of
calendaring, contact lists, notes and a musical alarm clock
variation that will wake you up to your favorite song in
the morning. With the ability to carry up to 30GB of
storage (in some models), this little unit can be used for
far more than just music. Think of it as an electronic
briefcase of sort. Files can be taken anywhere at any
time; memos can be used as reminders to yourself; even
interviews can be accomplished when using the microphone
option, with the ability to then utilize those audio files
in a documentary format.