Customer retention is crucial for a business to expand its scope in the market.

Back in time, businesses used to store and manage customer data manually due to the lack of proper tools and technology. Over time, tools like Excel or Doc came into the market, and businesses started using them, but managing data through these tools was tedious and time-consuming.

With the advancement of technology, tools like CRM came into the market. There are various tools available, among which Salesforce CRM is the most popular based on cloud technology. Today, multiple businesses are using such tools for the customization of customer data and other significant purposes.

Salesforce automates numerous business processes that help increase productivity and mandatory updates are released for the same every year. Test automation Salesforce is crucial to ensure that business continuity and customer relationships stay in sync.

What Is Salesforce Automation Testing?

Salesforce Automation testing refers to the use of automated tools to help improve the quality of testing, reduce errors, and speed up the testing process. Automation testing is crucial for the development process to ensure that the applications built on the platform meet the requirements of the business and function properly.

Challenges Faced By Businesses While Automating Salesforce
Though automation is necessary for Salesforce and it has many benefits, there are some challenges associated with test automation in Salesforce.

1. Regular Updates in the System
   To address the concerns and to provide a better experience to customers, there are regular updates and modifications released by Salesforce. Regular updates and modifications may affect the routine activities in Salesforce applications. Due to this, the Quality Assurance team has to put in a lot of effort to maintain and deliver the required updates. Apart from this, the use of a code-based platform further complicates the process of automation.

2. Dynamic Components
   Salesforce includes many dynamic components, like UI elements and decision tables. Whenever any changes occur in test scripts, the changes also take place in dynamic components. Due to this, the overall process of automation testing gets affected.

3. Data Management
   To carry out the test automation of Salesforce, consistent and accurate data is required. However, test data management becomes challenging whenever data-dependent and complex scenarios arise

4. Integration Testing
   Salesforce is also integrated with other systems and applications, due to this, integration testing becomes crucial. However, to carry out the integration testing, a skilled workforce is needed.

5. Skilled Workforce
   For automation of the Salesforce platform, a specialized workforce is required and is not easily available within an organization. So, the cost increases while hiring external experts.

In a nutshell, there are various challenges associated with Salesforce automation testing, but with the right strategy and testing tools, it can be accomplished.

Best Methods For Salesforce Automation Testing

A. Workflow Rules
The rules of the workflow are primarily meant to automate the standard internal procedures. It is one of the effective methods of test automation in Salesforce as it saves time. The workflow rules encompass the features that alert authorized people.

B. Process Builder
It is the graphical representation of automated processes made by the builder. For the processes that are performed manually, the technique of process builder helps automate those processes. Moreover, tasks, such as field updation, sending emails, etc., can also be included in this method.

C. Visualforce Pages
It is a framework that permits the developers to create a custom user interface in the Salesforce applications. Additionally, with the help of visual force pages, custom interfaces can be provided to users, and hence the automation testing of Salesforce can be performed easily.

D. Apex Triggers
It empowers the developer to write the custom logic for data modification and updates. Due to this, complex automation can also be performed in the Salesforce application.

E. Third-Party Apps
There are many third-party apps available for Salesforce automation testing. Not only this, these third-party apps can be easily integrated with Salesforce applications, and the tasks, such as email marketing, data management, etc., can easily be automated.

Advantages Of Automated Salesforce Testing

There are many advantages of test automation Salesforce

1. Improved productivity
   The automation testing of Salesforce enables the QA teams to perform more tasks in lesser periods and thus help improve productivity.

2. Scalability
   The scalability gets increased because the automation in Salesforce does not require any additional resources or staff.

3. Time-Efficient
   Automation testing minimizes the extent of manual data entry and repetitive tasks. The automated process streamlines repetitive tasks and helps employees focus on other important tasks.

4. Consistency
   Automated processes enhance the rate of consistency in data entry. Moreover, the automation increases

Final Thoughts

Now, you are well aware that test automation in Salesforce is vital to making the most of your Salesforce platform. So, choosing the right salesforce testing platform is important.

Opkey is the platform that is built specifically for Salesforce. It provides the test mining technology that discovers the Salesforce test that is currently running. Apart from this, it offers no-code test creation to support continuous testing.