Do you have an awesome admin who has taken really good care of your Salesforce org this year? Do you wish you could give them something that would make their work life a bit easier? If so, we recommend you consider gifting them a Personal Edition license to XL Connector by Xappex.
Now, there is a caveat that we want you to take into consideration before purchasing: XL Connector (in our humble opinion) is not for the newly minted administrator. Just like you wouldn’t give a new driver a brand-new Ferrari as their first car (or at least we wouldn’t recommend it), we don’t recommend giving a new admin XL Connector. XL Connector is a powerful tool for someone who may not be experienced enough to understand its capabilities.
Honestly, we wouldn’t recommend giving a newly minted administrator access to any Extract, Transform and Load (ETL) tool until someone has walked them through the do’s and don'ts of changing data and put enough fear in their heart that they triple check their work before executing any process!
On to the good stuff! Like why XL Connector would make a great gift.
1. XL Connector integrates with Microsoft Excel which is a huge time saver and one of the reasons we love this tool. Most admins start out using the Salesforce Data Loader. If you're using the Salesforce Data Loader you will have to follow multiple steps before you can execute the process of inserting, editing or deleting your data:
a. Download the report in a .csv file format
b. Save the file in a folder where you store your recent data loads – this step is optional, but we recommend keeping your load file for at least 30 days in case you need to refer to it for any reason
c. Log into the Data Loader tool – if you have multiple Salesforce instances that you log into (test and production) you will need to log out of the data loader to switch environments and log into the new environment to execute the next function. You will also have to remember your passwords for each instance if they are not identical.
d. Select your object and upload your file
e. Map your fields if they don’t automatically map based on the column headers
f. Save your mapping file if you need to repeat the load process
g. Identify where you want the success and error file stored after the process has been completed
h. Execute the process
With XL Connector, you have multiple steps to complete, but XL Connector executes and updates everything in the same spreadsheet:
a. Download the report from Salesforce in .xls or .csv format.
b. Log into XL Connector if you haven’t already and select the server. The server determines which usernames and passwords are presented for selection.
c. Select the action that you want to perform: Delete/Undelete, Upsert, Update or Insert
d. Select your object
e. Map your fields
f. Click update to execute the process
You will immediately see in your spreadsheet which records were successfully updated, and which records failed and the reason. There’s also an additional bonus: you can review your errors, update them and execute the process against only the error records in the same spreadsheet.
2. XL Connector also makes it very easy to bypass Salesforce duplicate rules by setting a checkbox to checked before executing the process. As an admin, you’ll often have to insert data that you've scrubbed for duplicates and completeness outside of Salesforce prior to loading the data.
In these instances, you don’t want Salesforce’s duplicate checks to execute while you’re loading the data because they will block you from inserting. If you’re using the Salesforce Data Loader, you have two options to "turn off” duplicate checking:
a. Turn off the duplicate rules – if you’re inserting the records during the workday, you don’t want to turn off the rules; that would impact all users and may allow duplicates into the environment.
b. Create a duplicate rule condition to exempt a user – this would allow a user to always bypass the duplicate rules which may not be the best approach because we all make mistakes.
Instead of going through all those steps to bypass the duplicate rules, XL Connector lets you set the checkbox to true during the loads and you’re done. You don’t have to modify your standard duplicate rule configuration day to day.
3. XL Connector also has several other powerful features which we find to be time savers. You can:
a. Convert Salesforce ID’s from 15 to 18 digits with the click of a button
b. Manage workflow rules with the ability to mass activate/deactivate, create, edit and delete.
c. Export data directly into Excel. You can export an entire object, filter your results or identify specific fields that you want returned in the export.
So, now that we’ve helped you figure out what to get that awesome admin in your organization, the last step is for you to make it happen! Feel free to visit www.xappex.com and check out XL Connector (formerly known as Enabler4Excel).
Have an interesting Salesforce challenge you’d like help solving? Contact Us
