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Salesforce Lighting Experience — Still Thinking of Migration?
• Date: January 2018 •
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The pace at which technology is evolving today is the fastest ever, and Salesforce is at the forefront of change. The CRM constantly introduces new groundbreaking features, reshaping the way companies around the world interact with clients. Einstein AI, G Suite integration, Data Studio, Financial Services Cloud are just a few of the recent introductions of the platform.
Over two years ago, Salesforce announced its newest user interface — Lightning Experience (LEX). Although the Classic UI has been a true eyesore for many end users, especially given the current focus on exceptional user experience and visually appealing UIs, Lightning is not actually a substitute to the Classic UI, as shifting towards Lightning is purely optional, at least for now. That is, the company actually provides its customers with an opportunity to decide for themselves whether they need the new user interface.
Lots of organizations using the CRM took a chance on Salesforce Lightning and actually loved it! We at Twistellar couldn't be more excited about Lightning, we actually played with it a bit and introduced our own Lightning upgrade – DASH.
If you're among those who are still thinking of migration and are hesitant about making the leap and migrate to LEX, take a look at this overview of Salesforce new UI and its business benefits.
Over two years ago, Salesforce announced its newest user interface — Lightning Experience (LEX). Although the Classic UI has been a true eyesore for many end users, especially given the current focus on exceptional user experience and visually appealing UIs, Lightning is not actually a substitute to the Classic UI, as shifting towards Lightning is purely optional, at least for now. That is, the company actually provides its customers with an opportunity to decide for themselves whether they need the new user interface.
Lots of organizations using the CRM took a chance on Salesforce Lightning and actually loved it! We at Twistellar couldn't be more excited about Lightning, we actually played with it a bit and introduced our own Lightning upgrade – DASH.
If you're among those who are still thinking of migration and are hesitant about making the leap and migrate to LEX, take a look at this overview of Salesforce new UI and its business benefits.
Salesforce Lightning vs. Classic UI: Key Differences
The reason behind the introduction of another user interface is the company's aspiration to make the job of each member of your team across all departments easier. More specifically, it is meant to accelerate salespeople's job, helping them to close leads faster, boost service representatives productivity and so on. How does the UI do that? Here is a list of some of Salesforce Lightning core features and benefits for you to get the idea. With the help of the new UI, users can:
Navigate the CRM faster thanks to optimized pages layout. Sales accounts, opportunities, campaigns and other pages got revamped to enable users to do the same job in fewer clicks. What we at Twistellar especially like about Lightning is its Home Page which now has a performance chart, calendar, information on high-priority leads, opportunities, and other things gathered in a single place and in an easy-to-make-out way.
Leverage the benefits of AI. Each Lightning feature prepares the ground for artificial intelligence adoption. Let's take how sales reps can now see accounts and contacts pages as an example — account record detail pages have now Account Insights, which are also visible on the Home Page.
Get a complete view of opportunities using Opportunity Kanban — a simple drag-and-drop visualization tool which allows changing deals' statuses and efficiently organizing them in the pipeline.
Easily create Lightning apps for specific departments to help their members complete tasks specific to their job. This requires basically no coding experience as a simple drag-and-drop API is offered.
Classic features missing in LEX
Though Lightning has been used for over two years now, it is still incomplete and new features are added to it constantly. Right now there are some things that, according to some users, are better implemented in Classic UI than in Lightning Experience. Here are the most prominent of them in our opinion.
Probably the biggest benefit of Classic over Lightning is its higher customizability. Classic UI allows each user to add tools and apps to the utility bar and personalize the home page to their liking, which isn't available in Lightning. With LEX, it's up to admins to decide which apps and in what order are displayed in the utility bar. Still, users can add tabs they use frequently to their favorites.
Another feature that Lightning users are going to miss is some functionality regarding Opportunities and Leads. For example, Opportunity Teams, Splits, and Big Deal notifications are only available in the Classic UI, and so are lead campaign history, change lead owner and duplicate lead merging features. To make up for this, Lightning Experience has a customizable highlights panel, activity timeline, sales path feature and an opportunity board which we've already mentioned.
Probably the biggest benefit of Classic over Lightning is its higher customizability. Classic UI allows each user to add tools and apps to the utility bar and personalize the home page to their liking, which isn't available in Lightning. With LEX, it's up to admins to decide which apps and in what order are displayed in the utility bar. Still, users can add tabs they use frequently to their favorites.
Another feature that Lightning users are going to miss is some functionality regarding Opportunities and Leads. For example, Opportunity Teams, Splits, and Big Deal notifications are only available in the Classic UI, and so are lead campaign history, change lead owner and duplicate lead merging features. To make up for this, Lightning Experience has a customizable highlights panel, activity timeline, sales path feature and an opportunity board which we've already mentioned.
Salesforce Lightning Migration: Is It Worth It?
Given the ongoing development of LEX, a lot of users are still wavering over migrating to it. Here, the best course of action is to weigh up whether what you get by choosing Lightning will make up for what you'll be missing. We bet that in most cases Lightning is worth at least giving it a try and using it in tandem with Classic.
A thing to be noted here is that not all organizations can make the switch to the new UI. There are several Salesforce editions and licenses whose users don't have such option. Besides, users can face some compatibility issues regarding their browser choice. With this said, let's discuss the biggest issue you might face when making the move to Lightning Experience.
A thing to be noted here is that not all organizations can make the switch to the new UI. There are several Salesforce editions and licenses whose users don't have such option. Besides, users can face some compatibility issues regarding their browser choice. With this said, let's discuss the biggest issue you might face when making the move to Lightning Experience.
What about my favorite applications?
It is no secret that to make full use of Salesforce CRM, just to subscribe to the platform isn't enough. Organizations also need to integrate it with other software to make their whole IT environment work as a seamless whole. Besides, lots of apps provided by Salesforce developers through the AppExchange store are aimed to maximize Salesforce potential. The apps can be aimed at a single department of the company or the entire organization, facilitating the work of its members and increasing their productivity.
At the same time, not all the apps are compatible with Lightning Experience. This means that if an organization relies heavily on an app that is not available in LEX, complete migration to it is hardly possible, unless the company is ready to invest in developing a Lightning-compatible analog of the app.
At the same time, not all the apps are compatible with Lightning Experience. This means that if an organization relies heavily on an app that is not available in LEX, complete migration to it is hardly possible, unless the company is ready to invest in developing a Lightning-compatible analog of the app.
Should we move to Lightning now?
A great thing about Lightning is that users can switch from it to Classic and back whenever necessary. This makes the transition smooth both for admins and users, as they don't need to give up features they are accustomed to at once but rather have a chance to check out their Lightning alternatives (if any).
As you could see, there is no universal answer to the question whether a company using Salesforce should migrate to Lightning right now. It all depends on the specifics of the organization's IT environment and business needs. However, we strongly believe that in a few years all Salesforce orgs will be switched to Lightning, as Salesforce obviously spends huge efforts to promote it, so you'd better start thinking on that now.
As you could see, there is no universal answer to the question whether a company using Salesforce should migrate to Lightning right now. It all depends on the specifics of the organization's IT environment and business needs. However, we strongly believe that in a few years all Salesforce orgs will be switched to Lightning, as Salesforce obviously spends huge efforts to promote it, so you'd better start thinking on that now.
Please reach out for free advice, if you have any questions.
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If you have made up your mind to move to the new user interface and need help performing the migration, do not hesitate to contact us at Twistellar.
We are a team of Salesforce professionals with years-long experience in dealing with customer relationship management software. Twistellar provides companies with outstanding Salesforce consulting services, custom development, auditing and support.