Salesforce Automotive Cloud Ultimate Guide with Insider Tips

You might already be familiar with the feature called Household Management if you know automotive companies who’ve used other Salesforce platforms. It’s been handy for automotive companies in various clouds, ranging from Retail experiences to Non-Profit. Essentially, this tool equips automotive companies with a flexible data sharing structure unified customer, and certain features that make it easier to keep track of customer interactions with multiple individuals from the same family or, more accurately, the same household.

Shifting gears to the all-important matter of vehicle data management, let’s talk about the Automotive Data Foundation. Salesforce says they’ve drawn inspiration from the STAR (Standard In Automotive Retail) standard for their vehicle data model. Upon closer inspection, it seems like Salesforce has given it their own unique spin rather than adopting it outright. Regardless, the familiarity of the data model is a huge plus, making it feel like we’ve already got a foot on the gas pedal towards a more efficient future.

When it comes to Lead Management, the Automotive Cloud goes a few steps further than the standard Salesforce Sales Cloud. In addition to the basic foundation it inherits from Salesforce, the Automotive edition includes Products, Preferred Seller, Action Plans, and even the ability to link one automotive lead management name to one or more other partners with multiple vehicles of interest. These enhancements hint at a lead management system specially designed for organizations dealing with multiple sellers launch partners, or distributors. So if you’re a manufacturer, distributor, or large importer, it seems Salesforce had you in mind when they revved up this feature.

Revving up next is the Dealer Performance Management feature. The Salesforce Automotive Cloud lets automotive companies monitor dealers performance through rebate claims (we’ll dive into rebates a bit later). What really gets our engines running about this feature is its ability to not only report on vehicles as a whole, but also on their individual parts through the Assets feature. There is one little bump in the road though – to access this performance functionality, you need Salesforce Automotive Cloud licenses. But don’t hit the brakes just yet! There’s a potential detour via the Experience Cloud, which we’ll be exploring in the upcoming chapter. Stay tuned!

Now, let’s get to the really juicy bit. Salesforce has released what they’re calling a “tailored for automotive Experience Cloud”. It’s a bit of a half-and-half situation. They’ve added a couple of extra objects, which, to be honest, would be accessible anyway with Platform Licenses (let’s park the discussion on licensing for now, it’s a winding road!). After taking it for a spin, we found out that it’s essentially a salesforce Partner Portal template, fine-tuned for lead distribution and opportunity tracking for retail partners (pretty much for dealers). It’s a pretty slick addition if it syncs well with your business model.

Ever taken a peek at Salesforce forecasting? Well, the Salesforce Automotive Cloud has a fresh take on this. They’ve decked out the forecasting functionality, likely with manufacturers in mind (we’re honestly scratching our heads a bit to figure out who else might use this specific feature). Generally, it’s ERP systems that handle these kinds of data tables. But Salesforce is quick to clarify they’re not trying to race against ERPs. Their angle? They’re focusing on future sales projections instead of past performance. A pretty interesting turn, don’t you think?

Buckle up, because the Rebates feature is quite the ride. It’s a biggie and particularly pertinent to the automotive industry, deserving an article all of its own. But hold on, there’s a bit of a terminology twist. You see, in most automotive circles, what Salesforce calls ‘rebates’ are usually termed ‘campaigns’. So, if you’re new to the Salesforce universe, this might throw you off track a little. But here’s the silver lining – Salesforce includes a super handy business rule engine for rebate approvals. This could be a real game-changer, especially when dealing with a high volume of rebates, or ‘campaigns’ as we’re more accustomed to calling them in the automotive industry.

Interestingly, one element that seems to have taken the back seat in Salesforce’s promotional materials, yet definitely warrants your attention, is their warranty management feature. This function offers a comprehensive and powerful solution for handling warranties in the automotive industry, a sector where warranty claims and the customer experiences, customer loyalty and service are closely linked. Even though it’s not the star of the show in Salesforce’s communication, this feature is actually a hidden gem. It’s been fine-tuned to track warranty details, streamline claim processes, and facilitate better customer relations, all crucial in today’s competitive automotive landscape. So while Salesforce might not be shining a spotlight on it, we believe the warranty management feature is truly an unsung hero that deserves recognition in their suite of offerings.

Along with Manufacturing Cloud, Salesforce automotive service cloud comes with, what used to be called Tableau CRM now called CRM Analytics with pretty nice prebuilt dashboards. We always loved Tableau and it’s design, even when it’s a bit out of place, this tools enables companies and automotive companies to build really sophisticated reports from data available on the Salesforce platform. This is especially handy, if you are looking to shift most of your IT operations to Salesforce, but still have to keep some legacy systems. These licenses will allow you to integrate third party data sources and access report and dashboard straight from your automotive service cloud.