Some insights, some ideas, and a lot of fun!
Imagine sitting in a roller coaster – right before it starts, there’s a gush of emotions and thoughts that take you aback. However, your excitement and the enthusiasm triumphs over all those feelings and you’re set for the ride. This is exactly how Dreamforce 2017 has been – a learning and a fun-filled roller coaster experience!
Illustrious keynote speakers included Michele Obama, Ashton Kutcher, Mark Cuban, the omnipresent voice of will.i.am and Ginny Rommety the CEO of IBM. But it was the speech by Salesforce CEO, Marc Benioff that that stole the show. Without notes or a TelePrompter, he engaged the audience in a mesmerizing talk about the 4th industrial revolution and Salesforce’s lending hand to this new transformational phase.
Attending various keynote speeches, lots of learning
Salesforce growth in the next few years
Lest we forget the size of the event and the growth of Salesforce. The estimated crowd at Dreamforce this year was over 170,000. At the core of Salesforce is its philanthropic giving, this was reinforced almost everywhere. The “doing well by doing good” philosophy has never stunted the growth of this software giant – Salesforce is predicting sales of just over $10 billion dollars this year. In a meeting before security analysts at Dreamforce, Salesforce management predicted, they would more than double their sales in 4 years. Such favorable comments lifted their stock price to an all-time high.
Salesforce stock and sales are growing almost as fast as their new skyscraper in downtown San Francisco
A big announcement with Google
One of the highlights of Dreamforce this year was the announcement of a strategic partnership with Google. This follows previous years’ blockbuster partnerships with Amazon AWS and IBM cloud. The partnership with Google is designed to deliver smarter, and more collaborative experiences for customers – new integrations that connect Salesforce with Google Analytics 360 and G Suite. Users can now connect sales, marketing, and advertising data across Salesforce Sales Cloud.
The forward march to Lightning
If there was ever a doubt about Salesforce’s commitment to Lightning, that was stamped out once and for all. All new Salesforce developments have to be Lightning ready, while just maintenance is being performed on the classic version. There were also additional product announcements that further strengthened commitment to their artificial intelligence component, Einstein as well as their Internet of Things (IoT) initiative.
Extentia at Dreamforce
Our presence at Dreamforce was substantial – six of us were there this year! On the achievement front – we are proud that one of our team members achieved the Sales Cloud Consultant certification. Not to leave the fitness front behind, all of us compiled a large numbers of steps – improving our fitness regimen.
Our team will climb even higher next year
Dreamforce 2018 is already on our calendar
Read other Extentia Blog posts here!