Hi All,

Just a quick reminder about our Salesforce Sydney User Group Learning Session next week. There's no end of topics to discuss, tips and tricks to share and great ideas to learn, so it'll be well worth the entry fee, which as always is nothing at all. Here's the rough agenda for the meeting:

- Brief welcome and intro from Glenn
- An update on the Referral Partner Program from Gareth Baker, salesforce.com Alliances Manager, Corporate Sales, Australia/NZ.
-- Gareth will fill us in on how you can make money simply by referring new customers to Salesforce.
- A run through the new features in the forthcoming Winter '09 release (due in early October).
- Demo and discussion of some underused Salesforce features, such as public tagging, custom report types and inbound email services.
- General discussion on anything Salesforce-related, e.g.:
-- what's your favourite AppExchange app?
-- what features do your users like or dislike?

Venue and time details are:

Date: Wednesday 8 October 2008
Time: 4:30pm to 6:00pm (followed by drinks and chat thereafter)
Venue: The board room at salesforce.com Sydney office Level 11, Tower 3 - Darling Park, 201 Sussex St, Sydney

So if you haven't registered for this meeting, please do so here: 8 October registration

Come along, bring some questions you want answered, or tips you want to brag about, and meet some like-minded Salesforce users. Any questions, just give me a call, otherwise I'll see you on the 8th.

Regards,
Glenn.
0416 728395
glenn_dot_elliott_at_myriadminds_dot_com_au

Hi All,

I hope this finds you all well and enjoying the fact that spring is sputtering into life after an occasionally brisk winter. Salesforce.com have been as busy as ever, with last week's City Tour event in Melbourne and the upcoming Tour de Force event in Sydney next week. If you haven't registered for that one yet, you can do so at http://tour.force.com/city?city=65. I'll be going along of course, so if you'd like to catch up over a corporate-funded beverage and a mouth watering canape, then do give me a call or drop me an email.

It's also worth mentioning that the Winter '09 release of Salesforce is due in October and detailed release notes have now been made available here. There are a variety of interesting inclusions here, a few highlights being revisions to Connect for Outlook, scheduled emailing of reports and Visualforce email templates.

Most importantly, however, is the news that our next Sydney User Group Learning Session has been arranged and is set for:

Date: Wednesday 8 October 2008
Time: 4:30pm to 6:00pm (followed by drinks and chat thereafter)
Venue: The board room at salesforce.com Sydney office Level 11, Tower 3 - Darling Park, 201 Sussex St, Sydney

Now, as I mentioned recently on the user group blog, Keith Franks from Citect is hosting the Power User session on 30 September (contact him directly if you want to join that one). This Learning Session, however, is aimed at all levels of user and will be a mix of the latest news from Salesforce, "how to" advice on key features plus a lively open discussion on any Salesforce topics you'd like to cover. I'll be in touch nearer the time with a more detailed agenda, but if you'd like to come along, please register here: 8 October registration

Any questions, do feel free to call me on 0416 728395 or email me at glenn.elliott@myriadminds.com.au. I look forward to seeing you all on the 8th!

Cheers,
Glenn.
0416 728 395
glenn_dot_elliott_at_myriadminds_dot_com_dot_au

Hi All,

I mentioned some months ago that we thought it best to split the user group into two kinds of meetings: Learning sessions and Power User sessions. As you may be aware, Keith Franks from Citect has kindly offered to run the Power User sessions and I'll continue to host the Learning sessions myself. Of course you're welcome to come along to both or just stick to the one that might suit you best - it's up to you.

So here's a briefing on the upcoming Power User Session from Keith:

"The Salesforce Power User Group is for those of us who look after Salesforce within our own organisation who are more advanced users of Salesforce. The idea behind the group is to “compare notes” and discuss in a group how we do things in our particular instance. The whole idea behind this is that by actually going through the specifics of how we all do common things within our own instance, we can find out if we are all doing things the same way, or if someone has stumbled upon an easier/better/faster way to do the same thing. In essence, we all benefit from the group mind.

After gathering feedback from some of you, the responses on how to format the meeting have been varied. Therefore, I thought it would be best to at least get the ball rolling and have our first meeting. We can always discuss ways to improve the group once we meet.

So, the Salesforce office in the city has been gracious enough to allow us to use their facilities for this meeting. I have set a date and I’m hoping that you can all make it. If not, let me know why (for example, time/day/date change, location, etc) and I’ll see what we can do if there’s a common theme.

The meeting will be at 4pm on September 30th. I have the meeting room booked until around 5:30 so we have plenty of time, but I would expect that these sessions shouldn’t go for more than about an hour.

Please bring with you your laptop and some suggestions of areas you’d like to know about. We’ll focus on a specific area of Salesforce each meeting so a list of themes will be great for future meetings. If you don’t have a laptop we’ll be able to sort something out, and there will be a projector so that we can illustrate the points we are making. There is also wireless internet available in the boardroom as well as power points.
While we are focussing on advanced users of Salesforce, the purpose is not really to get into things like Apex code, but more the way that processes, fields, layouts and so on are set up in your instance. If anyone IS interested in an APEX code I know of someone else who is running a group for that purpose, so let me know.

Please send me a quick email to let me know that you will or won’t be coming, if you are no longer interested or if you know someone else who would like to come. Although I’m sure you all know the office, here are the details again:

Salesforce Power User Group
September 30th, 4pm – 5:30pm
Salesforce Sydney Office
Tower 3 – Darling Park, Level 11,
201 Sussex Street, Sydney

I look forward to seeing you all soon,

Keith Franks
keith_dot_franks_at_citect_dot_com"

So get in touch with Keith re the Power User Group and I'll be in touch shortly re the next scheduled Learning session also.

Cheers,
Glenn.
0416 728 395
glenn_dot_elliott_at_myriadminds_dot_com_dot_au

Hi All,

A couple of newsworthy points I want to bring to your attention.

Are any of you planning to visit Dreamforce this year? If so, let me know before you register, as user group members are entitled to US$100 off early bird prices. I'll be sending a mass email to user group members about this very shortly, but feel free to contact me directly as well.

For those of you interested in delivering business solutions on the Force.com platform, here's an intriguing Magic Quadrant analysis by Gartner on the enterprise application server market. Now, that all sounds a bit propellor-head-esque of course, but the key business message is Gartner's recognition of Force.com as visionary player in this space, with an increasing ability to execute alongside the major established vendors. Well worth a read: https://www.salesforce.com/form/pdf/gartner_eas_magicq.jsp?d=70130000000E2aX

Stay tuned here soon, as I'll be back in touch with news of our forthcoming user group meeting.

Cheers,
Glenn.
0416 728 395
glenn_dot_elliott_at_myriadminds_dot_com_dot_au

Hi All,

Just a quick note to remind you of our Salesforce Sydney User Group Learning Session this Wednesday. Please note that the start time is in fact 4:30pm (not 4pm as previously stated).

The theme for this session is relationships (the Salesforce kind, not the people kind - that would be more than we could handle in 90 minutes, frankly). I talk to users all the time and find that many of the challenges they face in Salesforce could be overcome by better understanding relationships and the various ways in which to combine fields from various objects. For example:

• Have you ever wished that in your list of high-value opportunities closing this month, you could show the account's phone number?
• Or wouldn't it be great to show the grand total of an opportunity's product line items on the opportunity page layout and opportunity list views?
• Or when you email a contact, how do you include the account's order balance as a merge field in your template?

Recent releases of Salesforce have made all of this (and a lot more) possible without rekeying data. We'll run through some "how to" demos of killer functionality, such as cross-object formulas, many-to-many relationships and roll up summary fields, showing you how using these in combination can bring impressive results.

Bring along your ideas, questions and discussion points, as it will be a very informal and interactive session. There's always a lively chat or two extending into the nibbles and drinks afterwards, too. If you still haven't registered, please do so here: registration.

Here are the details again:

Date: Wednesday 2 July
Time: 4:30pm to 6:00pm (followed by drinks and chat thereafter)
Venue: The board room at salesforce.com Sydney office Level 11, Tower 3 - Darling Park, 201 Sussex St, Sydney

Looking forward to seeing you there!

Regards,
Glenn.
0416 728 395
glenn_dot_elliott_at_myriadminds_dot_com_dot_au

Hi All,

Just to let you know that our next User Group Learning Session is scheduled for 2 July from 4pm-6pm and will be held at salesforce.com's Sydney office,

Date: Wednesday 2 July
Time: 4:00pm to 6:00pm (followed by drinks and chat thereafter)
Venue: salesforce.com Sydney office Level 11, Tower 3 - Darling Park, 201 Sussex St, Sydney

I'll update the blog here nearer the time with an agenda (got a suggestion? Drop me an email or call.), but please register for the event here: registration.

Thanks, and I look forward to seeing you on the 2nd.

Cheers,
Glenn.
0416 728 395
glenn_dot_elliott_at_myriadminds_dot_com_dot_au

Hi All,

Firstly, apologies for being a slightly slack user group leader. I mentioned after our last meeting that I'd publish the code to the s-controls that were demonstrated, which I haven't done ... until now. Sorry about that! Here they are, somewhat belatedly:

John Rotenstein's pull-down list of related contacts: click here

Glenn's traffic light overdue indicator: click here

If it's been so long that you don't remember what these are all about, just drop me a line at glenn dot elliott at myriadminds dot com dot au and I'd be happy to run you through it.

Cheers,

Glenn.

Hi All,

Just a quick note to remind you that our Salesforce Sydney User Group Learning Session is happening next week, on Thursday 10 April from 11:00 to 12:30. It will be held as part of the CRM Success Tour event (details here) at Doltone House, Jones Bay Wharf, Piers 19-21 Upper Deck, 26-32 Pirrama Road, Pyrmont NSW 2009. If you haven't registered for the Learning Session yet, please do so at:

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=HySuXwWa1Rx1ivPeHG7l3w_3d_3d

... by COB Monday 7 April.

The agenda for the meeting will be light on formalities and heavy on discussion, demos and interaction:

AGENDA

1. Quick introductions and an update on Sydney User Group happenings.
2. Demonstration of key functionality:
* Profiles/Record Types/Page Layouts: a "how-to" demo of profiles, record types and page layouts working together to provide a rich user experience that's specific to each staff member's duties in the company. We'll show you step-by-step how to create this functionality, using the example of quotation and order management for a FMCG wholesaler.
* S-controls for richer detail pages: a demo of some more advanced s-control techniques to spark your imagination, such as traffic-light conditional formatting and displaying parent fields on a child object.
3. Q&A and discussion of the demonstrated concepts
4. Adjourn for buffet lunch

I'm looking forward to seeing you all there. If you have any questions, feel free to email me or give me a call on 0416 728395.

Cheers,
Glenn.

I hope this finds you well and enjoying a bumper start to 2008. I wanted to fill you in on upcoming Salesforce Sydney User Group events.

First up we have the Salesforce Spring '08 User Group Gathering on the evening of Thursday 6 March from 5:30pm at L'Aqua (Roof Terrace, Cockle Bay Wharf, Darling Park, 201 Sussex St, Sydney 2000). This is an informal and relaxed networking session where you can chat with other users, hear from a few salesforce.com partners and get the lowdown on the Spring '08 release. You can find out more and register for this event here: http://www.salesforce.com/au/events/customer/local-user-groups/70130000000DhhAAAS.jsp

Then, it's time for our next Salesforce Sydney User Group meetings. In order to meet the needs of the diverse range (and large number) of group members, I've listened to your feedback and opted to hold two meetings: a Learning Session and an Expert Forum.

The Learning Session is aimed at relative newcomers and mid-level users of Salesforce, and will run much as our previous meetings have. We'll demo some useful functionality on a given theme, discuss real-world examples, hear from salesforce.com representatives and generally help you explore what's possible, all in an informal, interactive manner. The Learning Session will be held from 11:00am to 12:30 on Thursday 10 April to link in nicely with salesforce.com's City Tour luncheon in Sydney on the same day (you'll hear more on this from salesforce.com soon). To register, please enter your details here: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=HySuXwWa1Rx1ivPeHG7l3w_3d_3d

The Expert Forum is intended for the more experienced/hardened/leading edge campaigners who are looking to discuss more complex issues with other relative experts. Here we'll focus on key design questions and debate the pros and cons of advanced functionality. Stay tuned for a scheduled date for this one, but it'll be in April shortly after the Learning Session.

I look forward to seeing some familiar faces and plenty of new ones at these events. If you have any questions, feel free to email me or give me a call on 0416 728395.

Regards,

Glenn.

Hi All,

The demo slides re campaign management from last week's meeting can be downloaded here.

Also, Tomasz's slides re Winter 08 and the recent security enhancements are available here.

Feel free to get in otuch with me at glenn.elliott__at__myriadminds.com.au and have a great Christmas and New Year.

Cheers,

Glenn.