The phrase “360 Degree View of the Customer” is often used to describe the benefits of Salesforce and CRM. By linking all of the sales and service history records for your customer, you can better sell to and service your customer.
But there is a problem that is inherent to CRM systems. The CRM system provides a database and an interface that allows you to see customer records linked together assuming that you do not have duplicate records. Duplicate records are the opposite of a 360 degree view. Two duplicate records provide a 180 degree view of your customer. Four duplicate records provide a 90 degree view. 180 degree views do not make customers happy and they prevent your organization from getting the value out of Salesforce.
You invested significantly in getting this 360 degree view. You want to make sure you achieve it. Deduping is an answer. Really good deduping is the right answer.
So what makes for really good deduping?
#1 Highly configurable matching that a business user understands
You need to be able to define business rules for matching records at the field level. You need to be able to set several variations in matching between fields (for example, 84% match on first name, 91% match on last name). You need to be able to use fields from multiple objects to match (like Account and Contact). And you need to be able to define several rules that execute simultaneously so that records are compared from every angle. Example:
Rule 1 Account Name, First Name, Last Name, Cell Phone
Rule 2 Account Name, First Name, Last Name, Street Name and Number
Rule 3 Account Website, First Name, Last Name, Email
#2 Powerful Best Record Capabilities
You need to be able to intelligently select a survivor among duplicate records and cherry pick the best field values from records that are consolidated during a merge.
#3 Match Anything, Everywhere
You need to be able to dedupe native Salesforce objects and you may need to dedupe custom objects. You need deduping that is automatic, that runs in the background on all of your data, without user intervention. And you need it to work with your users in the Salesforce screens to prevent the entry of duplicate records, in a way that doesn’t interrupt their workflow.
Get really good deduping. Increase usability by eliminating duplicate records. Achieve the 360 degree view of your customers.
