At its dawn, Salesforce used to be just a CRM provider. In 2024, it has evolved into a leading cloud platform with comprehensive functionality and data analytics. Data doesn’t lie. As of 2024, Salesforce holds a 21.8% market share in CRM. More than its four top competitors put together. And rightly so! With artificial intelligence at the core of the Salesforce ecosystem, the tech giant now redefines customer relationships across multiple verticals, from healthcare and edTech to manufacturing, real estate, and automotive. So, what does the future hold for the salesforce ecosystem? What emerging trends will redefine everything we know about customer relationship management? Want to dive deeper? Read on.
Even the biggest names in the business, like Microsoft, Adobe, SAP, and Oracle, can’t keep up with Salesforce, which is a leader in CRM innovation. More specifically, Salesforce’s Marketing Cloud had a market share of 14.7% in H1 2022, compared to 11.1% for Adobe, its closest competitor. Microsoft Dynamics 365 Sales was 3.3 times lower than Sales Cloud, which claimed 38.3 %. Oracle Service Cloud claimed 8.4% of the niche market, while Service Cloud took 44.9%.
Chart 1. Salesforce Annual Revenue Growth (2001-2024)
But what exactly makes it an absolute market leader?
1. Pioneering technology & innovation
Salesforce consistently incorporates cutting-edge technology into its platform, like AI-Einstein GPT, Data Cloud for real-time analytics, and Hyperforce for superior cloud architecture.
2. Comprehensive ecosystem
Salesforce created the largest enterprise app store, AppExchange, which offers a vast ecosystem of third-party integrations that allow users to personalize their CRM systems for a range of applications. This expands Salesforce’s ecosystem beyond typical CRM and targets sectors including manufacturing, healthcare, finance, and retail.
3. Focus on Customer 360
The Customer 360 platform provides valuable integration at every touchpoint in real time and delivers an integrated view of customer interaction. Such capabilities have helped develop personalization at every step in sales, service, marketing, and commerce.
4. Global scalability and compliance
Salesforce’s Hyperforce architecture underpins the need for scalability, security, and global compliance within a single platform. Supporting businesses of all sizes ensures they are able to address data residency needs and still provide consistent performance across markets.
5. Trailblazer community and learning culture
Salesforce’s Trailhead enables users to upskill themselves to guarantee the adoption and mastery of its tools. Its powerful community of Trailblazers is collaborative, innovative, and learns from one another, further building Salesforce’s brand loyalty and user expertise.
6. Adaptability to industry trends
Agility by Salesforce in embracing such trends as AI, sustainability, and multi-cloud strategies places it at an edge regarding thought leadership. The fact that Salesforce can be ahead and act on emerging market needs secures the platform in tandem with growing business needs.
7. Proven track record of ROI
Companies with Salesforce show increased productivity, customer retention, and higher revenue generation. Business value goes beyond just software and translates into accountable business results.
Salesforce Einstein GPT improves CRM, sales, marketing, and customer service by integrating generative AI technologies—more specifically Generative Pretrained Transformer (GPT) models—into the Salesforce ecosystem. Launched back in 2023, this revolutionary AI tool automates repetitive tasks and boosts productivity across teams. For example, it helps sales experts generate emails and responses, schedule meetings, and prepare for customer interactions. In marketing, this tool helps generate personalized content to increase marketing campaign response rates and boost customer engagement with targeted messages. But this is not the limit. By integrating with OpenAI’s enterprise-grade ChatGPT technology, Einstein GPT becomes an indispensable tool for:
What’s new in Einstein GPT? In 2025, it is set to improve customer experience even further. As of now, it works seamlessly across the Sales, Service, and Marketing cloud, providing enhanced operational efficiency. The Salesforce technology also responds to real-time customer interactions rather than solely relying on historical data. Finally, it provides a higher degree of accessibility. No matter if you’re a small business owner or running a huge corporation — this tool can scale to suit your specific needs.
Winter ’25 release is expected to introduce an array of updates across many clouds, including Data Cloud. Customer profiles were traditionally updated periodically, which resulted in information that was either out-of-date or lacking. Data Cloud makes it possible to integrate data in real time from many sources, including online, mobile, IoT devices, and more, resulting in a 360-degree, constantly-updating picture of every client.
Additionally, it will offer improved integration capabilities with external databases and applications, facilitating smooth data flow and guaranteeing that companies can employ all of their systems for more efficient operations and well-informed decision-making. Essentially, here’s everything the updated Data Cloud will provide in 2025:
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Agentic AI is on the rise, and Salesforce doesn’t stand aside. Its Agentforce 2.0, promised to be generally available in February 2025, is its updated digital labor platform that seamlessly integrates AI agents across a number of functions. The updated Atlas Reasoning Engine enhances the agents’ ability to make decisions and carry out tasks, allowing them to manage intricate, multi-step procedures with increased accuracy and precision. Just think of how an AI agent with the improved engine could manage a customer service escalation process on its own: recognizing a high-priority issue, gathering relevant information from various systems, proposing a plan of action to resolve it, connecting with the right teams, and then providing the customer a personalized update—all without the need for human assistance. This is a shining example of digital transformation we never realized we couldn’t live without!
Teams can also greatly benefit from its integration into the Slack ecosystem, helping them respond to messages instantly, schedule meetings, and even assign tasks. When needed, the AI agent can consolidate customer data to instantly provide insights. Plus, it can also suggest the next-best action based on the insights obtained, kick off workflows, and send notifications ensuring nothing sneaks past relevant team member’s attention. What else about this salesforce platform is new?
Salesforce Customer 360 platform is a CRM system that connects all departments across your organization, including sales and service and provides them with a unified view of your customers. It has become a top priority for businesses looking to provide their end-users with a seamless experience, especially since 90% of consumers expect consistent interactions across channels. With the help of this platform, you can improve sales teams’ performance by granting them full control of the sales pipeline and automate processes to ensure they focus on selling. Plus, you can view which marketing assets customers engage with the most and optimize campaigns accordingly. Finally, your support representatives have full access to the purchase details captured by sales, further enhancing CX.
Here’s what’s new about the most recent update:
This update is expected to help address a variety of business challenges, enabling users to access data seamlessly, enhance personalization, and improve ROI.
Sustainability is not just a buzzword. It’s an essential indicator that a business is making proactive steps towards safeguarding a better future. Customers, investors, and regulatory bodies demand organizations be mindful of the impact their operations have on the environment, and Salesforce Net Zero Cloud is at the forefront of this effort. It enables businesses to monitor and reduce emissions across the whole value chain and benchmark with suppliers. The platform offers progress tracking towards net-zero targets, actionable reduction recommendations, and intelligent emissions estimates. With features like auto-updated datasets, audit-ready reporting, and the ability to leverage data from several sources, it also guarantees investor transparency and complies with relevant regulations.
All these features, along with materiality assessment, supplier management, data gap filling, and ESG Disclosure Reporting with Einstein AI will help your business become more environmentally aware, adopting more sustainable approaches in 2025 and beyond.
Tableau is a leading data visualization tool that helps businesses make the most of their data. With its advanced data analysis tools and customer-centric customizable dashboards, it is on a mission to improve data intelligence for all.
The 2024.3 version of Tableau brings improvements designed to improve data visualization and simplify cloud analytics management, such as:
These feature enhancements reflect the increasing demand for analytics tools to be flexible and easy to use. Tableau’s distinctive value proposition, which combines innovation with practical functionality, will keep it ahead of the competition as every business competes to use data science as a competitive advantage.
Salesforce is reshaping how it works with partners and shifting away from its traditional focus on developing standalone apps. New strategic alliances with major players like Amazon, Snowflake, Walmart, and Mastercard reflect a move toward connected cloud platforms.
For example, businesses with an existing Amazon Web Services (AWS) commitment can now use AWS credits to cover Salesforce solutions, including Marketing Cloud. Zero-ETL integration with Snowflake Data Cloud helps unify data with fewer technical hurdles. Meanwhile, the Walmart partnership ties Walmart’s last-mile delivery network into Salesforce Commerce Cloud, and the Mastercard venture brings dispute resolution tools to Financial Services Cloud. These partnerships allow organizations to connect services and data more directly, rather than juggling multiple fragmented systems.
For developers, AppExchange still provides a marketplace for Salesforce add-ons, but the larger strategy goes beyond traditional integrations. It puts different cloud services under one umbrella, giving teams more flexibility in how they purchase and piece together solutions.
During the next year, we can expect to see a rebound in the Salesforce job market after a temporary decline. Notably, the Cloud tech giant will look primarily for professionals with deep expertise in big data, the Internet of Things, and blockchain technology. In regions like India, where demand for Salesforce talent has already increased by 13% year over year, this comeback is anticipated to be especially noticeable. The demand for technical skills will reach unprecedented levels. For example, administrators’ responsibilities may change to include more specialized duties and an emphasis on sophisticated automation and configuration abilities. In a similar vein, developers will have to adjust to new frameworks and technologies.
Salesforce has revolutionized the CRM industry, and this trend shows no signs of slowing down. Why? Because it provides a “one-size-fits-all” solution, enabling organizations to stay ahead of the curve by providing hyper-personalized experiences. Ever heard the quote, “Don’t find customers for your products; find products for your customers,” by entrepreneur and 20-time best-selling sales and marketing author Seth Godin? It’s almost as if the essence of Salesforce is written between the lines.
Want to explore the future of CRM solutions and stay updated on the latest Salesforce news? Interested in what Salesforce professionals will be in demand in 2025 and beyond? Contact Avenga, your trusted global Salesforce powerhouse.
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