Salesforce recently launched its Salesforce App for Outlook for Outlook and Office 365. It’s the latest development in Salesforce.com’s partnership with Microsoft. Pros
- It’s 100% cloud based.Salesforce has another application for Outlook called Salesforce for Outlook that requires end users to install the application. It can be difficult to install and maintain Salesforce for Outlook on different versions of Outlook across multiple PCs. The Salesforce App for Outlook cloud application avoids the administrative and IT headaches and is compatible with Outlook 2013 and Outlook Web App. Users of earlier versions of Outlook will still need to use Salesforce for Outlook.
- It brings Salesforce information into the inbox.You can view related Salesforce contacts, leads, accounts, opportunities, and cases when you receive an email in Outlook. As a result, you don’t have to leave Outlook to look up important information inside Salesforce.
Cons The Salesforce App for Outlook is currently in beta and has important limitations.
- You can’t log emails from Outlook to Salesforce.
- You can’t create new Salesforce leads, contacts, accounts, cases, opportunities, tasks, events, and othe</div>
</div>r records from Outlook.
- You can’t update Salesforce leads, contacts, accounts, cases, opportunities, tasks, events, and other records from Outlook.
- You don’t have access to create or update records with record types, custom fields, dependent picklists, etc.
- You can’t access custom objects.
- You can’t track your emails so see when recipients open your emails.
- You can’t use Salesforce templates inside Outlook.
- You can’t sync your Outlook calendar with Salesforce.
If you want all of these features today, you can start a free 14-day trial of Cirrus Insight for Office 365.
| Cirrus Insight |
Salesforce App for Outlook |
| 100% cloud Outlook client |
Yes |
Yes |
| Install client by Exchange 2013 /Office 365 admin for all users in minutes |
Yes |
Yes |
| View Salesforce information in Outlook |
Yes |
Yes |
| 100% cloud calendar sync |
Yes |
No |
| Attach Outlook events to Salesforce contacts |
Yes |
No |
| Email tracking |
Yes |
No |
| Use Salesforce email templates in Outlook |
Yes |
No |
| Attach emails to any record in Salesforce |
Yes |
No |
| Create and update Salesforce records from Outlook |
Yes |
No |
Cirrus Insight was the first application to integrate Salesforce with Outlook and Office 365 on the new Microsoft framework. In partnership with Microsoft, we launched Cirrus Insight seven months ago. It’s available today on the Office Store where an Office 365 administrator can install the cloud application for any size organization in a matter of a few minutes. Cirrus Insight for Office 365 is also fully integrated with the Cirrus Insight suite of mobile applications for iPhone, iPad, and Android. If you’re deploying Salesforce and Office 365, or if you’re already on board with both cloud platforms, schedule a live demo with us and we can help you immediately ramp up sales productivity and Salesforce adoption and ROI.