These days, nothing is more enjoyable to marketers than catching up, exchanging ideas, and collectively, and as a group, blaming sales.  I kid, nothing like a Dad Joke for Father’s Day… Back to our opening. Salesforce’s Connections is a can’t-miss, annual event where marketers can ramp up on the latest trends in customer engagement and learn how the Salesforce ecosystem is innovating and adapting to its exciting new capabilities. This year was no different, with a plethora of announcements and informative side-sessions, Connections did nothing but build on the past and lay the groundwork for the next 9-12 months. A lot was announced, but here are the main talking points worth your time.

AI Cloud is coming

Over the last year or two, Salesforce has gradually unveiled its vision for a future featuring AI. As such, Salesforce announced AI Cloud. For marketers, a core component of AI Cloud will be something called Marketing GPT, which will be an integrated suite of features meant to take a lot of the grunt work out of marketing by replacing it with really smart AI. The use cases for Marketing GPT are exciting, highlighted by content creation and list building. With AI Cloud, marketers will be able to create content quickly, everything from email content to subject lines for use in campaigns. Content will be optimized based on previous engagement so it is optimized and informed every time. Aside from content creation, another area that can be painful for average marketers is list building. This might sound simple, but when you’re looking to build a single list based on data stored in several connected databases and Data Cloud, the queries could become quite complex. Marketing GPT will try to simplify list building by replacing the entire process with an input that leverages AI to connect the dots. For many marketers, this might sound like overkill but for the few building complex lists from complex sources, this will prove to be the ultimate time saver.

The Customer 360 reins

In many cases, Data Cloud is the glue that brings everything together and enables the Customer 360. This is the idea that a single person might have dozens of different types of interactions across their lifecycle with a business; from first-time website visitor to a customer with support tickets and evolving needs. All those disparate data points live in different systems but can easily be unified against a single profile in Data Cloud for use in any other system in a more informed way. Sounds complex and time consuming right? Yes, maybe, but it doesn’t always have to be. Since data is your most important business asset and enables processes across the entire customer lifecycle, it certainly deserves everyone’s best effort to be used in a relevant, accurate and universal way. With the right tool and expert, your customer data can be a competitive advantage.

At its core remains an industry-leading CRM

The CRM is where all the magic comes together to convert a lead, close a deal, or interact with any one of a customer’s many data points and experiences. This is the place where individuals go to complete tasks or teams go to collaborate on an account. For many marketers, the most important collaboration they will experience is with the Sales team as they work together to follow-up and qualify leads. Sales Cloud remains the system of record for many of these important collaborations and can be the impetus for sustained growth.