Salesforce.com Providers: Time to Thrive or Die in the As-a-Service Economy

Through the process of researching the forthcoming HfS Research Salesforce Services Blueprint report over the last several months we have heard back from enterprises about how their expectations for their Salesforce implementation and maintenance service providers are changing. It is evident that the Salesforce services market is moving away from tactical implementation projects largely of the Sales cloud to long- term relationships where service providers support enterprises across a broad ecosystem of Salesforce platforms and third party solutions.

Because enterprises are using Salesforce as a platform to meet their strategic marketing, sales and service needs it is changing the requirements for what it means to be a strategic partner on Salesforce. To truly meet the needs of the enterprises, the leading service providers around Salesforce are stepping up their investments in accelerators, industry solutions, third party partnerships, cross-platform training and a deeper business understanding of specific industry sectors to make this a successful experience for customers.

Clearly, the investments required of service providers around Salesforce are increasing all the time, but so too are the benefits for enterprises of working with service providers who have planned for and are working through this increasingly complex ecosystem. This is the new reality of Salesforce solutions, which we expect to see on display in the exhibit halls of the Moscone Center during Dreamforce 15 and then in our evaluation of the service providers that we will publish as part of the Blueprint Report in October.