CRM Fundamentals and Practice
Learn how to improve customer experience using customer relationship management platforms such as Salesforce.
- DurationApprox 12 weeks
4 hrs per week
Boost your career in customer experience management
Customer experience (CX) and customer success professionals are in high demand, and are only expected to grow in the coming years. Growing your knowledge in these areas means that you could compete for one of 3.3 million new jobs expected to need Salesforce skills between 2016 and 2022.
Do you want to learn CRM skills to grow customer loyalty and sales for your organisation?
Customer relationship management (CRM) systems are key tools in CX management. The global industry is estimated to be worth $50 billion and is the biggest software market in the world. 60% of companies are expected to invest even more in this technology to help them generate reliable customer data to support data-driven decision making.
Want to be a part of this growing industry?
This ExpertTrack will teach you how to use Salesforce, including how to set up Salesforce at your organisation, and acquire key CRM skills to grow customer loyalty and sales.
The three courses have been designed in collaboration with Salesforce’s industry experts, offering an expert insider view of the platform used by 83% of Fortune 500 companies.
Discover how to improve customer experience (CX) using CRM systems
These three courses will impart key CRM skills to those looking for a career in customer experience management.
You will learn how to use Salesforce to improve customer experience at your organisation. You’ll also be empowered to utilise data-driven decision making to inform your customer experience strategy. The first course will teach you fundamentals of how to use Salesforce. You’ll learn how to set up the platform and basic Salesforce administration.
The second course explores how to manage leads, opportunities, accounts and contracts in Salesforce, how to run Salesforce reports and set up dashboards to gain insights from your customer data, and will also explore how to manage customer data.
The final course covers how to use Salesforce automation. This helps to improve customer experience by making sure that key opportunities for customer engagement aren’t missed. You’ll also explore CRM best practice.
Equipped with the CRM skills from this course, you’ll be ready to kickstart your career in customer experience management.
Content for this ExpertTrack has been adapted from the Customer Experience Management with Salesforce Training Microcredential - if you want to find out more, take a look at the Microcredential which offers smaller cohorts with tutor interactions and academic credit.
Industry statistics
- Median base salary£42,500
- UK job openings/month1,966
Key skills you will learn
- Customer experience design
- Customer journeys
- Customer value strategies
- Customer success management
- CRM technologies
- Salesforce
- Customer experience management
- Customer success
- Customer relationship management
- Data-driven decision making
- Customer data
- Customer strategy
Learning outcomes
By the end of the ExpertTrack, you’ll be able to...
- Identify administration fundamentals and how to set them up in Salesforce
- Evaluate criteria to construct customer experience processes
- Create, identify and evaluate customer options via data held on CRM systems
- Articulate how to automate processes and workflows and create support processes
- Identify best practices for CRM
Experience required
This ExpertTrack is suitable for anyone who wants to learn how to use Salesforce to improve customer experience. No prior experience is required for this customer experience management ExpertTrack. Some prior knowledge of customer relationship management, customer success, or customer experience design would be beneficial. This is not essential, however, as these courses cover fundamental aspects of customer relationship management.
During the ExpertTrack we’ll be using the Salesforce Trailblazer platform.
Getting started
This Salesforce ExpertTrack will help you understand how to improve customer experience using CRM systems. In particular, it will enhance the CRM skills and employability of:
- early-stage or aspiring customer success and customer experience management professionals
- early-career customer experience managers looking for a CRM consultant role
- business development and sales professionals looking to improve customer experience
- product and marketing professionals whose roles rely on customer data and customer experience design, or who require Salesforce skills and experience
ExpertTrack course overview
Course 1
CRM Fundamentals and Practice: Introduction to Salesforce
Begin to understand how to use Salesforce CRM software to generate customer insights, in this introductory course.
1 test
4 weeks
4 hours per week
Week 1
Introduction to the course and Salesforce
- Welcome to the course
- Administrator fundamentals and the Salesforce ecosystem
- Wrap-up
Week 2
Organisational setup
- Introduction
- Organisational setup
- Collaboration on Chatter
- Wrap-up
Week 3
Admin and user setup
- Introduction
- Mobile administration
- User setup
- Wrap-up
Week 4
Security and activity management
- Introduction
- Security and access
- Activity management
- Wrap-up
Course 2
CRM Fundamentals and Practice: Salesforce Reports, Objects, and Data Management
Continue learning how to use Salesforce in this course covering Salesforce reports, Salesforce objects, data management and more.
1 test
4 weeks
4 hours per week
Week 1
Introduction to the course and object customisation
- Introduction
- Object customisation
- Wrap up
Week 2
Data management
- Introduction
- Data management
- Wrap up
Week 3
Sales and marketing
- Introduction
- Sales and marketing
- Wrap up
Week 4
Reports and dashboards
- Introduction
- Analytics: reports and dashboards
- Wrap up
Course 3
CRM Fundamentals and Practice: Salesforce Automation and Best Practice
Discover how to use Salesforce automation to make processes and workflows more effective, and explore CRM best practice.
1 test
4 weeks
4 hours per week
Week 1
Introduction to the course and workflow and process automation
- Welcome to the course
- Workflow and process automation
- Wrap up
Week 2
Service and support management
- Introduction
- Service and support management
- AppExchange
- Wrap up
Week 3
Best practices
- Introduction
- Best practices for CRM success
- Enhanced administration skills
- Wrap up
Week 4
Certification preparation and course wrap up
- Introduction
- Certification preparation
- Wrap up
Prove you're job ready
Highlight the new, job-relevant skills you’ve gained and supplement existing qualifications with a hard-earned, industry-specific digital certificate – plus one for every course within your ExpertTrack.
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- Receive certificates validated by the educating organisation.
- Create a shareable certificate link for your CV and LinkedIn.
- Impress employers with learning outcomes you can add to your CV.
- Make your career dreams a reality.
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World-class learning with FutureLearn
FutureLearn is jointly owned by The Open University and The SEEK Group and has been providing online courses for learners around the world over the last eight years.
This ExpertTrack is in collaboration with Salesforce
Learn how leading industry technology provider Salesforce is used to drive business success. Throughout the course you will leverage Salesforce for CRM activities.
This ExpertTrack is endorsed by Coventry University
This ExpertTrack is endorsed by Coventry University and delivered by FutureLearn as a quality professional development programme.
Meet your instructor
Experienced Salesforce consultant and project manager. Passionate about the Salesforce ecosystem and well versed in multi-cloud implementations. Certified Scrum Master and 4x Salesforce Certified.
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