To say that a lot has happened in the last year in the world of technology is something of an understatement. The initial public release of ChatGPT only happened a year ago in November 2022 – kicking off an explosion of popularity for artificial intelligence and a race for AI superiority across industries.

This same level of advancement is absolutely being seen in the world of B2B commerce, particularly since the Salesforce winter release is upon us yet again. The Winter ’24 release includes a number of features that are designed to empower product innovations using not only artificial intelligence but also big data, CRM tools, and more.

A Bold Step Forward for Salesforce

The Salesforce Winter ’24 release offers a number of exciting features that are significant for both B2B and D2C users. The Commerce Cloud has been updated in ways that people have been asking about for a long time.

Customers can now add up to 2,000 line items to a cart at any one time, for example. Product fields can also now show “Frequently Purchased” items to customers, information that dynamically changes in real-time thanks to Einstein Generative AI. Not only does this offer a unique way to personalize the shopping experience, but it’s also a great way to automatically embrace cross-sell and up-sell opportunities as well.

AI is making its presence known all across the Salesforce Winter ’24 release. Businesses can now begin selling faster than ever with automated org setup. This helps to streamline the store creation experience, saving a dramatic amount of time that can then be used on more important matters.

This release has also seen some changes to the Salesforce payments process, all of which helps to create a better experience for your own customers. In addition to direct debit techniques like ACH and BACS, organizations can also accept payments through PayPal and Venmo. The “Pay Now” page is now more configurable than it has ever been, offering users a way to access different payment records, share those records with relevant parties, and more.

Salesforce Order Management has also seen some major upgrades, particularly in terms of the “Order on Behalf Of” experience. Products can now be searched by name, key search terms, and more – as opposed to just SKUs and product IDs as it was in the past. Products can now be easily reserved during the ordering process, all to help reduce the chances of getting “out-of-stock” errors that hinder the overall experience.

Innovation Has Never Been Easier

Of course, Salesforce was updated in more ways than just via the Commerce Cloud. One of the biggest has to do with the Salesforce Scheduler. It’s now easier than ever to manage customers who pay a visit to a physical business location for in-person appointments. Actionable lists can be used to send out appointment reminders and a number of enhancements have been made to the “Shifts” feature within the Scheduler itself.

Einstein Search has also seen some positive adjustments. Searchable standard and custom objects can now be easily configured, allowing you to further customize Salesforce to meet your business’ needs. CLOUDSTREET is dedicated to providing cutting edge B2B technology and solutions to manufacturers in virtually every industry, including industrial, IT services, consumer goods, and more. Based on that, we understand exactly how important the need for further customization with a tool like Salesforce always is.

It’s also now possible to get specific answers from a knowledge resource by way of the Einstein Search Answers feature.

In an overarching sense, one of the most important adjustments to the Winter ’24 release has to do with modifications to Salesforce data pipelines. Staged data is now being used instead of datasets as it was in the past, which can dramatically decrease data processing time in most situations. Salesforce is now also compatible with not only the Google GA4 event-based property framework, but with Google Analytics 4 as well.

Finally, the Salesforce B2B Commerce Winter 24 release includes a bevvy of general enhancements that are intended to make the Lightning Experience even better. These include but are not limited to things like:

• Tools have been made available to help prepare for upcoming changes to the way Setup pages will be hosted on a new domain in a future release.
• Multifactor authentication (MFA) has been further enhanced and enforcement is now a permanent part of the direct login process.
• Many non-text UI elements have been improved in terms of buttons, checkboxes, and overall color contrast.
• The News, automated account fields, and automated account logo features are all being retired as of the Winter ’24 release.

To find out more information about the Salesforce B2B Commerce Winter ’24 release, head over to Salesforce’s own Release Notes.