Creating Reports in Salesforce – The Complete Guide

Salesforce is a complex platform which allows users to create, edit and manage company data in the form of reports and dashboards. Even a new user with almost no Salesforce training and minimal software skills can learn how to create reports in Salesforce. Reporting in Salesforce is easy once you are familiar with the interface of this CRM.

Furthermore, Salesforce offers great integration of functionality which makes data collaboration between various departments from company records a lot easier. It offers a wide range of applicability and can be used in companies from diverse backgrounds. When it comes to safety, one can be assured that Salesforce offers complete security of data and is 100% safe to use; making it the best system for creating reports.

 

Everything You Need to Know about Creating Reports in Salesforce

Reporting in Salesforce is simple and intuitive, once you are familiar with the interface of the software and have spent time researching the relevant Salesforce training material.

 

Steps to Follow

  *Chose the report type

Choosing the report type decides how the results, which include the fields and data, appear in the report. So picking the right report type is the first step towards creating schedule reports salesforce recommended. .

  *Choose the report format

One can use tabular, summary, joint or matrix format depending on the company requirements. The key behind choosing the right report format is that it should allow the complexity of the data to be presented in the easiest of manners through the report.

  *Create a report

The next step involves creating a new report; if one does not have a report to clone already.

  *Grouping the report data

Grouping the report data in a meaningful manner is the next step towards creating reports in Salesforce. Data needs to be organized in the form of columns and rows to serve purposeful information for joined, matrix or tabular format.

  *Report Builder Screen

The Report Builder Screen provides a preview of how your report would look like; when completed.

  *Report fields

The report fields’ pane displays the fields from the selected report. There’s also a list of custom formulas which you can add, edit or create while adding report data in the fields.

  *Summarizing data

The summary field is where you can view the numeric value of the data, such as the sum, maximum, minimum or average value for a data set. The summary field appears at the grouping level as well as at the subtotal level. This helps in creating reports in Salesforce with ease.

  *Subtotal Report Results

This option allows you to group information as set, align the groupings, and then compare the subtotal for each set against the overall subtotal. This feature is quite useful as it allows the user to analyze trends in the data.

  *Using “Smart Total”

Smart Total is a very useful feature used in Salesforce reporting which automatically omits the duplicate data the second time. This ensures that duplicate data is counted only once and brings efficiency in the report generated.

  *Using Formulas

Creating custom values is easy with courtesy Formulas which uses the calculated values using the report data. Formulas are one of the best features which help in to build the reports effectively.

  *Filtering data

Reports can be made more informative and useful by making use of these filters such as standard filters, row limits, field filters to name a few. Filtering data allows the users to create the report using only the data which is useful; leaving out the data which is not important for a report.

  *Saving reports

Once you’ve finished building reports in Salesforce, you can click on ‘Save’ to save the file. Or, you can also save the file as a copy of the original report using the ‘Save As’ option.

 

Features

Salesforce is truly an amazing system to use, given how complex it is and how many features it contains.

  *Salesforce1 app for iOS and Android

Download and use the Android and iOS app for Salesforce which gives the users privilege of working on their smartphone and tablet with ease!

  *Salesforce Files

Using this feature, users can store and retrieve files and documents in Salesforce itself; doing away with the need of storing files on a different platform. Salesforce Files has made Salesforce platform a lot more user-friendly and intuitive.

  *Salesforce Outlook Connector

This Salesforce Outlook plug-in allows the users to save the emails from their Outlook folder to a desired location on Salesforce. On the other hand, users can also avail this plug-in to view Salesforce records directly from Outlook.

 

Overall, Salesforce training is an amazing system for creating, editing and managing your company data and view it as reports and dashboards. The system is also quite easy to use and is customizable to match the requirements of different business types.

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Amanda is the Lead Author & Editor of Rainforce Blog. Amanda established the Rainforce blog to create a source for news and discussion about some of the issues, challenges, news, and ideas relating to Salesforce usage.