The Salesforce playbook for professional services.
Professional services firms are operationally complex businesses with thin margins, and the difference between top performers and the rest comes down to PSA discipline, utilization visibility, and the sales-to-delivery handoff. We help services firms build the operational infrastructure that scales the business without scaling the chaos.
- 14 chapters
- 5 Salesforce products in depth
- 14-point readiness checklist
- 10,643 words
What's inside.
Written by our Salesforce consultants for professional services. Read it start to finish or go straight to the chapter you need.
Salesforce in professional services: where it pays off
6 patterns that work, and the stack we typically deploy.
The challenges Salesforce has to solve
The 6 problems a design has to solve, plus 4 methods we use on them.
Which Salesforce products fit, and how
Salesforce Sales Cloud, Salesforce Marketing Cloud, Salesforce Revenue Cloud / CPQ, Tableau, Salesforce Service Cloud: use cases, data model and buyer questions for each.
How to implement it
Who needs to be in the room, what the first release includes, and the questions to settle before kickoff.
Moving from your current system
What moves from your current system, how to plan it, and the decisions to make early.
The systems to connect
10 systems to connect and what flows between them.
Regulation and compliance
6 rules and obligations the design has to account for.
Readiness checklist
14 decisions to make before you sign a statement of work.
What to measure
6 metrics to baseline before the build, with a worksheet.
After go-live: support and health checks
What ongoing support covers and when to run a health check.
If a project has stalled
How stalled projects get back on track, and how to get more from the org you have.
Results from our projects
15 results from Abstrakt Solutions projects.
Where the industry is concentrated, and local guides
Where the industry is the largest share of the local economy, and local guides for 56 metros.
Next steps
Free assessments and how to reach a consultant.
From the readiness checklist.
Three of the 14 decisions the playbook asks you to make before you sign a statement of work. The full checklist, with the rest of the playbook, is in the PDF.
Get the full playbook →- Agree a service line taxonomyFirms often name services inconsistently across practices and regions. Settle a standard taxonomy before building, because it drives forecasting, resource planning and cross-sell reporting. Changing it later means reworking reports, integrations and historical data, which is slow and frustrating for everyone involved.
- Fit selling around billable workPractitioners who sell will not tolerate heavy data entry. Use email integration, quick actions and mobile updates, and limit required fields to those that affect forecasting and staffing. Assign pipeline hygiene to practice operations staff where possible, so billable professionals can focus on clients.
- Respect client confidentiality and independenceConsulting and advisory firms may serve competitors and hold sensitive client information. Use sharing rules and restricted engagement records where confidentiality obligations apply. Firms subject to independence rules may also need a check before accepting work, which can become a step in the intake workflow.
The Salesforce products it covers.
Each product chapter covers use cases, how the data is modeled and the questions buyers ask. Shorter versions are on our site.
- Salesforce Sales Cloud for Professional ServicesSales Cloud helps consulting, accounting, engineering and technology services firms manage pursuits from first conversation to signed statement of work.
- Salesforce Marketing Cloud for Professional ServicesFor consulting, accounting, engineering and architecture firms, Marketing Cloud distributes expertise rather than products.
- Salesforce Revenue Cloud for Professional ServicesRevenue Cloud's quoting and pricing capabilities help professional services firms turn a scoped engagement into a consistent, approved proposal.
- Tableau for Professional Services FirmsTableau helps professional services firms connect the systems that describe their business: the CRM for pipeline and client relationships, the professional services automation or project system for time, staffing and budgets, and finance for billing, collections and cost.
- Salesforce Service Cloud for Professional ServicesService Cloud fits professional services firms whose client relationships include ongoing support, not just projects.
Who wrote it.
Abstrakt Solutions is a Salesforce Select partner based in St. Louis, with 108 Salesforce certifications, 7 Salesforce accreditations and a 4.95 out of 5 rating from 92 reviews on Salesforce AgentExchange (formerly AppExchange).
The playbook draws on the guidance we publish for professional services and on 15 of our own projects.
