Last month on Aug 10, Salesforce announced one product that nobody expected – Salesforce+. Till this point, there is no clear information about what exactly this product is, and other than business streaming which other area it would address?
If we think about all products & acquisitions Salesforce did, it completely made sense like Cloudcraze, Mulesoft, Wave Analytics, Tableau, Slack, etc. All the above products fit very well with enterprise customer’s needs today. The question is how does streaming fit in the Salesforce ecosystem? I was asking this question to myself in the last few weeks and I think I may be able to convince you why this is a great move.
If I ask you, in the last 2 years which product you have been using almost daily in your work life? All kinds of digital tools like Zoom or Webex for meetings, Youtube, Udemy or Pluralsight for training, Online degree, Netflix or Disney, etc for entertainment. Almost all of the above applications have one common thing directly or indirectly – VIDEO.
This week is Dreamforce 2021 and before Salesforce makes any announcement below are my top 5 predictions about this product other than streaming for business.
1. Live Stream for Salesforce Developers and Admins
Salesforce developers, admins, MVPs, Group Leaders, and release teams generate thousands of videos every year. Right now all videos are uploaded on youtube and in my opinion, it makes sense for Salesforce to find a new home for all these videos.
Definitely, youtube is the biggest video-sharing platform on the planet but there are many capabilities that are missing or annoying. Example – There is no control on which video would be displayed on my dashboard or which video would be recommended.
Also, youtube makes money from advertisements, it would be interesting to see whats Salesforce plans to capitalize on this product.
By limiting content type only to business-related, Salesforce would have control over a few of the problems of public platforms like Youtube.
2. Salesforce+ is not a competitor to streaming services like Netflix or Disney
Clearly, Salesforce+ is not for entertainment, so it is safe to rule out that its competitor to Disney+ or Netflix. In my opinion, it’s going to be more like a video hosting product with streaming capability, somewhat similar to Vimeo or Vidyard.
3. My Salesforce+
Every product that Salesforce has acquired or launched has to generate or be linked to revenue. If we think about the revenue model, It makes sense that this streaming service can be sold to customers in the same way myTrailhead. Customers could be able to host & stream business content within their company. It would give them huge benefits in terms of privacy and video usage tracking.
4. Integration with Zoom, Webex
Usage of online meeting tools like zoom, Webex, Slack and google hangouts has seen unprecedented demand and usage in the last 2 years because of work from home. That also means the demand for meeting recording has been spiked. How many times you or someone in your team has asked to share recordings? Those recordings could easily be added as part of some artifacts, decision-making in your ALM tool. Which tool you are using for maintaining these recordings? Zoom, Webex, etc does not give an intuitive way to share and analyze recording usage like view, download, etc.
It would be great if Salesforce+ can automatically download & upload recordings from these meeting platforms & enable it as business content with full analytics capability. I would love this capability to watch, rewatch these recordings on my phone, TV, or laptop.
5. Rename Salesforce+
And my last prediction is – product name would be changed in future. Like any other Salesforce product, once it starts shaping up, Salesforce could rename it. Examples – Lightning Connect, CPQ, Wave, Einstein Analytics, etc.
Feel free to let me know your thoughts, agree or disagree, would love to hear from you in below comments section.
Interesting perspective, loved them.. here are my thoughts..
#1 : Agreed, Salesforce does uses Vidyard for internal webinars, dreamforce events but IMO Youtube would still remain the #1 public sharing as it has far better reach out, to get someone into Salesforce ecosystem
#2 : Well said, its kind of competing to Vimeo or Vidyard but somehow, i don’t think they want to get into that business as stand alone, to compete it with Vimeo’s of the world
#3: This is much better thought USP, should be implicitly part of the broader MyTrailhead offering to host videos in Salesforce+ and embed for that organization. This could compete well with legacy LMS solutions.
#4 : Doesn’t sound to be a strong use case, for organization meetings like how often you would see recording.. but it does makes sense for events videos like For eg : if i have a dreamforce video for best practices in LWC, i can only download if i have youtube premium unless they embed for free in Salesforce+. Kind of extension of #1
#5 : Salesforce is Smart about this, am sure Einstein will keep thinking to spit out a new name soon but wishlist should be #3, part of MyTrailhead would just be simple to understand, connect smartly:)