With more than six million businesses and more than 60% of the Fortune 500 using Google’s G Suite (which includes Gmail) the integration of Gmail and Salesforce is a productive move for any modern sales team. If your sales teams are using Gmail and Salesforce it is critical that they use both applications together. McKinsey & Company reports that sales reps can spend up to 28% of their workday in calendars and email. It is imperative that Salesforce contain all of this important customer correspondence data.
When you integrate Salesforce and Gmail, you are helping your sales reps save time by skipping the manual process of entering data and having to switch between the two applications or systems. The Salesforce / Gmail integration also helps your sales teams track crucial emails that are relevant to the Salesforce records.
A tight integration between Salesforce and Gmail would enable your sales team to:
- Access Salesforce records and Gmail emails in one location. This makes it easier to create meaningful email conversations that are targeted to customers and prospects.
- Allows the sales reps to focus on what is most important to them and that is making sales.
- Saves time because there is no having to duplicate data in the two systems separately.
Sales Reps Use Gmail for a Variety of Reasons
Sales reps that are comfortable with Gmail do not even want to entertain the idea of having to use another email provider. Sales reps that use Gmail usually want to stick with it because its easy to use and they are comfortable with it. But even more important is that once their email system is connected to Salesforce – no sales rep will ever want to switch. They’ll never want to go back to manual data entry! Successful sales reps use Gmail for the following:
- Maintaining Contacts: The contacts saved in Gmail are like a card file only it is virtual.
- Sending Email Messages: Email is an effective way to communicate with new prospects and get begin new relationships.
- Schedule Appointments and Meetings: Sales reps use their calendars to schedule important events and to plan out their days.
Reasons Reps Use Salesforce
A majority of sales teams use Salesforce and love the automation it brings to their sales organization. Sales reps around the globe depend on Salesforce to help them become and remain successful. Reps use Salesforce for the following main reasons:
- Track impending deals in the pipeline.
- Schedule appointments and meetings.
- Maintain contacts and leads.
- Learn what cases are still outstanding.
AutoScribe and Salesforce
AutoScribe email integration is user friendly so that life and time flow ore smoothly for the sales team. SalesDirector’s Autoscribe is a plug and plays application that is transparent to the sales rep and automatically updates the CRM. Using AI (artificial intelligence) AutoScribe provides updates on the CRM for non-data entry activities such as phone calls, texts, meeting events, and client emails. Using AutoScribe also adds more benefits. AutoScribe can help to nudge, remind, and coach sales teams and individual reps via SMS text messages on how to manage their sales process and stay on track of their deals. Sales managers are also able to follow live updates and providing coaching to those sales reps out in the field.
Salesforce to Gmail integration is a win-win when AutoScribe is implemented. Having successful sales reps make for happier sales reps that can use the time they want to.
What About Salesforce Inbox and Lightning Sync?
As of Winter 2021, Lightning Sync will not be available in Lightning for new Salesforce customers. Einstein Activity Capture is Salesforce’s long term solution for syncing contacts and events between Microsoft and Google applications with Salesforce. As Salesforce continues to push customers to Einstein Activity Capture be aware of the limitations listed above in this article. If you are still on an older version of Salesforce and are using Salesforce Inbox keep in mind that your users are still manually linking emails to records in Salesforce.