Winter 18 Release Notes

As you should know Salesforce is regularly updated to keep it as the world’s most innovative and advanced CRM. Three times a year they release a major update. In October they are making a major release and you will see some changes when you use Salesforce.

There are thousands of exciting changes happening in the background all of which you can view here. Here is a summary of some of the key changes that may impact you:

New look and feel

 

  • Background  – You will notice that the layout has been improved to reduce ‘snow blindness’. There is now less glaring white on the screen and each component is framed in a darker background
  • Conditional Components – parts of the screen (not individual components) can be hidden or shown depending on the stage or field attributes of a record

More Dashboard Functionality

  • You can also add tables to dashboards with up to ten columns.
  • You can add dashboards straight onto the home screen or other pages

 

Lightning Report Builder (Beta)

At the moment when you build reports it takes you to an out of date looking drag and drop report building tool. Good news Salesforce have developed a better looking tool that is even more intuitive to use. At this stage you must opt into using this tool by changing some settings and permissions.  See https://releasenotes.docs.salesforce.com/en-us/winter18/release-notes/rn_rd_reports_lightning_report_builder.htm

Improved Lead Conversion

  • If you are using and converting leads then it’s now even easier to create and match to existing accounts, contacts and opportunities

 

Google Calendar Integration

This has been available in a limited form for over a year. But, it finally will do proper two way synchronisation better events in Salesforce and events on your calendar.

 

Many improvements to the user experience

  • Branded Communities – You can set up different brands and colors for your communities based on each partner
  • Mass editing from custom views – Edit multiple records at once straight from the related list (does not include related lists)
  • Merge Person Accounts – You can now merge person accounts from the person account screen. You do not need to use the quick link we created for you on your home screen
  • Better search – search now includes better spelling correction
  • Skype integration – if you use Skype for business it can now be integrated into Salesforce (there are some delays on the roll out of voice calls with Microsoft)
  • Better Einstein Ai – Ai is getting more tightly integrated across the Salesforce platforms
  • Longer Internet Explorer Support – Your users should be using a modern browser such as Chrome, Firefox or Microsfot Edge. If you have users on Internet Explorer you can opt in to keep support until 2020
  • More tools to integrate – Salesforce is the king of integration and they are making it quicker and easier for partners to integrate other systems

 

As mentioned there are thousands of other exciting changes happening which I don’t expect you to get excited about. If you have any questions get in touch [email protected]

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