AppExchange Turns 10: The Most Popular Salesforce Partner Apps

A Decade Of Downloads

It's been a decade since Salesforce introduced an online app store enabling partners to sell unique solutions enhancing Salesforce's core CRM software.

Today, AppExchange hosts more than 2,800 partner apps that have been installed 3.5 million times. Eighty-five percent of the Fortune 100 have installed at least one AppExchange App, and 79 percent of Salesforce customers use partner apps, according to the CRM leader.

For those following the cloud-focused startup back in 2006, AppExchange telegraphed a revolutionary vision that Salesforce would successfully implement over the coming years -- moving beyond a single Software-as-a-Service technology to becoming an enterprise-grade platform for the creation of novel and diverse solutions.

Since then, hundreds of independent software developers have built their businesses by selling on AppExchange unique tools backed by deep expertise in particular markets. And Salesforce relies on those third-party developers to keep meeting the rapidly evolving needs of its customers.

To mark its 10th anniversary, Salesforce shared with CRN the most downloaded AppExchange apps (Salesforce doesn't make available total number of downloads) for each of 12 business categories, from education to banking to government to retail.

Communications

Company: Vlocity

Headquarters: San Francisco

App: Vlocity Communications

This comprehensive suite of omni­channel sales, marketing, service, CPQ and order management applications was designed specifically for communications service providers and built entirely on the Salesforce1 platform. The Vlocity Communications suite helps businesses sell to and service both B2B and B2C customers. Vlocity has a channel program that includes many global systems integrators and sales force implementation providers as partners.

Education

Company: Groove Labs

Headquarters: Mountain View, Calif.

App: Gmail, Google Calendar and Google Apps Integration

Google Apps remains the go-to cloud-based office productivity suite for educational institutions. Groove's integration tools enable schools and universities to securely sync their Gmail and Google Calendar accounts with Salesforce's CRM in real time. The app displays contextual data and tools obtained from Salesforce within Gmail.

Financial Services (Commercial Banking)

Company: nCino

Headquarters: Wilmington, N.C.

App: nCino Bank Operating System

This solution, the most popular app in the Salesforce ecosystem among commercial banks, sits alongside a bank's core IT systems. The Bank Operating System offers financial institutions a suite of features for interacting with employees and customers, including CRM, document management, business intelligence and loan life cycle solutions. That drives profitability, productivity, compliance and operating transparency.

Financial Services (Life & Annuities Insurance)

Company: iPipeline

Headquarters: Exton, Pa.

App: AgentOne

This app delivers single sign-on access directly from Salesforce to tools that help insurance agents do just about every aspect of their job. AgentOne offers an integrated desktop that helps agents gather information, select products, run quotes, complete applications, guide customers through the insurance sales process and stay informed about delays in the process.

Government

Company: DocuSign

Headquarters: San Francisco

App: Electronic Signatures

DocuSign has been a pioneer in developing e-signature technology and the company's customer base spans the Fortune 500. The technology is also extremely popular in the public sector -- government customers downloaded DocuSign Electronic Signatures more than any other tool from the Salesforce AppExchange. DocuSign goes to market through an established and burgeoning global channel.

Health Care and Life Sciences

Company: Veeva Systems

Headquarters: Pleasanton, Calif.

App: Veeva CRM

Built on the Force.com platform, Veeva CRM is tailored to the health care and life sciences industry. The product delivers to pharmaceutical, biotechnology, animal health and consumer health companies a platform for engaging with their customers and providing unique content and services through multiple channels.

Manufacturing

Company: Apttus

Headquarters: San Mateo, Calif.

App: Apttus Configure Price Quote

Accurate and efficient price quoting is essential to manufacturers looking to drive sales from new and existing accounts. Apttus' CPQ solution, built on the Salesforce1 mobile platform and brought to market through a vibrant partner ecosystem, helps manufacturing companies manage configuration, pricing, quoting, discounts, incentives and proposals from any device.

Media

Company: Zuora

Headquarters: Foster City, Calif.

App: Zuora for Salesforce

Zuora for Salesforce enables customers to manage their subscription businesses by delivering quotes for new subscriptions, upgrades and renewals, pricing those products, automating billing and payment, and having full visibility into subscriber activity. Users have the ability to quickly configure tailored solutions on Force.com. Zuora partners with some of the largest global systems integrators and IT consultants, who deliver Zuora for Salesforce to media customers more often than any other app on AppExchange.

Nonprofits

Company: Cirrus Insight

Headquarters: Irvine, Calif.

App: Gmail, Google Apps, Google Calendar for Salesforce

Nonprofit entities prefer Cirrus Insight's solution for integrating Google App tools with their Salesforce accounts. Cirrus Insight's app enables users to track and manage customer information through their Gmail accounts, track emails and attachments, sync their CRM with Google Calendar, and schedule meetings through Gmail. Cirrus Insight has a channel program that includes many Salesforce implementation partners.

Professional Services

Company: FinancialForce

Headquarters: San Francisco

App: Professional Services Automation for Salesforce

Professional services firms turn to FinancialForce to gain visibility across sales, services delivery and finances. The app, brought to market through a vibrant partner ecosystem, delivers a mobile and social solution that automates and streamlines professional services tasks such as sales collaboration, project management, resource management, revenue management and services profitability.

Real Estate

Company: Propertybase

Headquarters: Berkeley, Calif.

App: Propertybase Real Estate CRM

Real Estate professionals have unique CRM needs, and the biggest names in the profession turn to Propertybase, and its network of consulting partners, more than any other vendor in the Salesforce ecosystem. Propertybase develops software for brokers, residential and commercial developers and franchises to manage their businesses. Users can publish listings, manage leads, integrate with MLS, track offers and agreements, and close deals.

Retail

Company: CloudCraze

Headquarters: Deerfield, Ill.

App: CloudCraze eCommerce for Salesforce

CloudCraze offers retailers a self-branded e-commerce solution built entirely on the Salesforce1 mobile platform. Users can deploy B2B or B2C storefronts that share data and processes with their CRMs. The user interface is configurable, and the solution offers merchandising, pricing, promotion and catalog content management, as well as integration interfaces for shipping, inventory and tax calculations.

Salesforce App Cloud

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Salesforce Data Cloud updates aim to ease data analysis, AI app development

Salesforce adds Einstein Copilot Search, vector database to its Data Cloud, to help enterprises take advantage of unstructured data for analysis, and build AI-based applications.

Salesforce is updating its Data Cloud with vector database and Einstein Copilot Search capabilities in an effort to help enterprises use unstructured data for analysis.

The customer relationship management (CRM) software provider’s Data Cloud, which is a part of the company’s Einstein 1 platform, is targeted at helping enterprises consolidate and align customer data.

The Einstein 1 platform, in turn, is a data engine with a low code and no code interface that is designed to let  enterprises  connect data to build AI-based applications.

As part of the updates, Salesforce has integrated vector database support via the Data Cloud Vector Database feature, which makes it easier for the Data Cloud to handle diverse data types.

“This database allows Salesforce customers to combine structured and unstructured data, creating a more comprehensive customer profile,” the company said in a press release, adding that once the unstructured data is added to the Data Cloud, it is automatically converted into a usable format across the Einstein 1 platform.

This, according to the company, makes the unstructured data available for analysis and utilization across various workflows within Salesforce applications including  Flow, Apex, and Tableau.

Salesforce has also added an AI search capability to Einstein Copilot, which will allow the generative AI-based assistant to interpret and respond to complex queries from enterprise users by tapping into diverse data sources, including unstructured data.

“Copilot Search will provide precise, contextually relevant responses in a user’s workflow and bolster trust with source citations from the Einstein Trust Layer,” the company said.

The Einstein Trust Layer is based on a large language model (LLM) built into the platform to ensure data security and privacy.

In order to take advantage of unstructured data via Einstein Copilot Search, enterprises would have to create a new data pipeline that can be ingested by the Data Cloud and stored as unstructured data model objects.

These data model objects have to be transformed into data fit for use in AI applications by converting the data into embeddings, which are numeric representations of data optimized for use in AI algorithms, the company said, adding that these embeddings are then indexed for use in search across the Einstein 1 platform alongside any other existing structured data.

The Einstein Copilot Search capability can also be paired with retrieval augmented generation (RAG) tools — which Salesforce supplies — in order to enable Einstein Copilot to answer customer questions. Answers comes with semantically relevant information, citing the knowledge sources used to craft the answers, the company said.