There are three things that need to work well for a business to become excellent:
- People
- Processes
- Technology
Salesforce developed the Business Excellence curriculum to help partners optimize their customers’ organizational and process capabilities to use their technology to its fullest. We’re excited to offer best practices from this program with our partners, starting with Sales Excellence!
Sales Excellence centers around a customer engagement—also known as a maturity assessment—in which partners consult and measure a sales organization’s people and processes. The Sales Excellence framework helps partners identify gaps relevant to a customer's goals and provides best practices to follow. This process is very impactful to the customer relationship. It improves trust, expands a partner's group of stakeholders, and creates a business and value-oriented roadmap with the customer.
About the Sales Business Excellence Accredited Professional (AP) credential
The Sales Business Excellence AP credential tests your skills and knowledge in conducting a maturity assessment and developing a business and value-oriented roadmap for a sales organization’s people and processes. With its change management focus, this credential is the perfect complement to the product-focused “Sales Cloud Consultant” certification.
The exam tests partners on different aspects of a sales excellence customer engagement.
For instance, how do you identify your stakeholders within a sales organization, and what are their key goals and key performance indicators (KPIs)? How do you determine how well your customer is doing at forecasting, account management, opportunities, and pipeline management? From there, how do you provide recommendations on the customer’s people, processes, and technology to get them to their target maturity or goal state? At the end of the assessment, what does your co-created roadmap look like? The curriculum will help you answer exactly those questions.
Let's get into the four sections of the AP exam
Customer relationships: During this initial phase, partners are tested on how they use key customer business details to develop a point of view around the customer’s current sales processes. Then, they develop a customer-specific stakeholder map and communications strategy with stakeholder visibility.
Discovery: In this second phase, partners align with stakeholders to identify and align on the customer’s scope, timeline, and key success metrics. They also launch a steering committee meeting to attain executive commitment. Lastly, using the details derived in discovery, partners use standard templates to develop an engagement plan.
Assess and recommend: Next, partners prepare, schedule, and perform interviews and synthesize the interview data to determine ratings and next steps. Then, they provide specific capabilities recommendations to support the customer’s business objectives, along with stakeholder agreement on what’s recommended.
Execute: In this final stage, partners identify the roles needed to create the customer’s roadmap, which includes the business and technology solutions needed. Once the roadmap is finalized, partners use a standardized template to develop a change management and communications strategy.
While supplies last, you can win a FREE voucher when you prepare for the exam with the Sales Business Excellence curriculum as part of the Learn and Earn Giveaway. This offer is valid through October 31, 2022.
Want to take a closer look at what the Sales Business Excellence credential includes? Download the Sales Business Excellence credential fact sheet. Once you're prepared and ready for the exam, your next step is to register in PLC.
Sales Business Excellence AP Resources:
- Sales Business Excellence AP Credential
- Sales Business Excellence Curriculum
- Sales Business Excellence Credential Fact Sheet
- Sales Excellence Partner Pocket Guide
- Business Excellence at Salesforce Partner Community Group
