In today’s highly interconnected world, information sharing has found its new meaning in the form of cloud computing. It refers to an advanced model that enables every device connected to the network to share a vast pool of configurable computing resources. These resources may include internet, applications, servers so on and so forth.
Effectively the central idea behind the need for cloud computing is enhanced interconnectivity through a significantly secure network. As a result, there is a more rapid communication around the world with greater security. Cloud computing has other relevant aspects such as wireless connectivity through mobiles, tablets and other personalized devices, which means the data is no more confined to a single network.
Salesforce AppExchange is a similar cloud computing platform through which users can have instant access to software products and services. It offers a wide range of apps that provide industry solutions in various fields such as medium and small businesses, customer services, education, medicine, manufacturing and real estate. Salesforce AppExchange, being one of the largest cloud computing marketplaces also offers custom developed applications where one can build, customize and develop Salesforce applications.
The overwhelming presence of Salesforce AppExchange is evident by the fact that it has over 2,800 apps that are dedicatedly providing services in their respective specific fields.
Here are 5 of the most potent Salesforce apps that are worth considering:
The InsideView’s social selling approach is clinical in nature as it delivers the right message to the right person. It uses sales intelligence by extensively analyzing your social network connections. The updating and importing features of InsideView are very robust, which immediately helps in updating your Salesforce database. In terms of efficacy, it allows you to monitor more than 25,000 sources for the purpose of acquiring sales intelligence, which is vital for new product releases, business mergers etc to stay ahead than your competitors. One of the important features of InsideView is “People Alerts” that provides valuable information by tracking activities from different social media profiles.
#2. Adobe EchoSign
Arguably the most used app from Salesforce AppExchange, Adobe EchoSign is utilized as a global electronic signature service that helps users to acquire document signatures from any mobile devices wherever they are located. The app is quicker and much easier to set up and configure. It is relatively easy to use so much so that it doesn’t require prior technical knowledge.
As, against the traditional processes, Adobe EchoSign is extremely efficient and faster in terms of closing business deals. All you need to do is use SalesForce credentials and straightaway send the documents out for signature. The recipients on the flipside can easily view and sign the documents or contracts in just a few clicks. Therefore in simple words, Adobe EchoSign can easily send, track and manage contracts.
#3. Cirrus Insight
It is one of the topmost SalesForce AppExchange Apps that allows the users to connect Gmail, Outlook, Office 365, iPad as well as Android with SalesForce. Every time a user sends emails from his Gmail account, SalesForce doesn’t log them from its native integration because it is impractical for everyday use. In that case your Gmail account should be logged in whenever you have to send an email. Cirrus Insight, therefore, removes this difficulty from your workflow.
Cirrus Insight’s Email Sync is a powerful feature that allows the users to save their emails to the appropriate client record along with the attachments. It also saves and tracks emails to SalesForce. Apart from that the Email Sync feature creates and edits SalesForce records right from your Gmail account.
#4. Agile Accelerator
The Agile Accelerator is the app that is a combination of various popular frameworks put together by SalesForce. It is essentially a tool that is specifically designed for agile development, which consolidates Scrum, QA and bug tracking into a single a single interface known as Grand Unified System (GUS). Moreover the Agile Accelerator is helpful in following ways:
- – It effectively tracks business requirements, measures progress and successfully delivers releases.
- – It efficiently uses drag and drop tools to manage backlogs and sprints.
- – It smoothly collaborates with cross-functional teams with the help of Chatter.
#5. Informatica Cloud Integration
For the successive five years, Informatica Cloud Integration app has been the topmost integration solution application on SalesForce AppExchange. Informatica Cloud is very potent and allows the users to easily connect to a variety of cloud, on-premises and mobile with an aim of efficiently sharing your relevant information. It is specifically designed to meet the needs of data integration for multiple users.
Informatica Cloud Integration looks beyond point-to-point integration by offering a complete suite of applications. The application is essentially an integration Platform as a Service (iPaaS), which is best suited for engaging with the customers and realizing the potential of your SalesForce investment.
#6. Jitterbit Cloud Data Loader
Jitterbit Cloud Data Loder is not just highest rated app on the SalesForce AppExchange but it is also the topmost choice of organizations that need easy to handle yet formidable data loading solution for the purpose of connecting SalesForce to any database. Jitterbit significantly reduces time and effort, which are required for automating imports and exports. This application was specifically designed for SalesForce administrators that greatly reduces the burden on IT resources.
It is considered as a robust data-migration and manipulation tool built for SalesForce platform in order to connect with external databases and documents. The databases which Jitterbit helps in connecting with SalesForce are MySQL, SQL Server, Oracle Database, CSV files, XLS/XLSX and TSV files.
#7. AscentERP
AscentERP is also among the top rated apps from SalesForce AppExchange, which offers a set of complete sales order and inventory management software. This app is specifically designed for manufacturing and production industries. The advance production features of this application are helpful in reducing the inventory mistakes. It allows in maintaining a centralized repository for all the items and product related information. The items can be tracked by their serial numbers.
AscentERP also allows you to create, receive, allocate and confirm purchase orders. It is easy to incorporate tractability for shipped orders with the help of AscentERP along with the ability to manage drop ship or blanket orders.
With the success of data-driven apps in SalesForce AppExchange, it can now be expected that the enterprise cloud enabled ecosystem app will be growing similarly. The experts have every reason to believe that SalesForce will boost AppExchange revenues at least 5 times over the period of next 5 years. However, listing the apps in AppExchange is not the final step; they should be regularly updated and improved to make relevant as per the changing needs.
