The Ultimate Guide to a Career as a Salesforce Developer
Salesforce is the world’s leading customer relationship management (CRM) solution, boasting a wide range of job roles and career opportunities with competitive salaries, excellent career progression and flexibility to work from home. As businesses move to a more digital workplace, the cloud-based CRM platform has continued to grow and so has the demand for Salesforce talent.
There are many different Salesforce avenues that work to maintain the functionality of the Salesforce CRM platform and Salesforce technologies, including Salesforce Developer, Salesforce Administrator and Salesforce Consultant roles. If you’re considering a career in Salesforce, you’ll want to know the difference between types of job roles to find your best fit.
If you’re just starting out in Salesforce or are looking to take your Salesforce career to new heights, the helpful team at Resource On Demand are here to connect you with your dream job.
What is a Salesforce Developer?
A Salesforce Developer builds solutions and custom applications for the Salesforce platform using a combination of code and no-code tools. They work with Salesforce technologies to build solutions for different Salesforce partners and their role is vital in solving complex problems. While some Salesforce Developers may specialise in one area, others provide a more rounded service, working with both back-end infrastructure and front-end experiences.
The Salesforce developer’s role is typically not very client facing although they may be hired by a Salesforce partner for the purpose of customising their Salesforce platform. Alternatively, Salesforce developer jobs may be occupied by an in-house programmer who is highly skilled at working with Salesforce. Salesforce developers must have a deep understanding of how the Salesforce cloud service works and be able to customise the CRM platform to the specifications of the hiring party.
What does a Salesforce Developer do?
The day-to-day roles and duties of a Salesforce Developer are similar to those of other professional developers. Salesforce Developers are required to analyse what the needs of the Salesforce partner are then design, test and develop software that provides solutions and create project plans for those needs. They also provide suggestions of new software upgrades for the partners existing apps, programs and systems, offering designs and plans for how those elements will work together.
More senior Salesforce Developers may be required to lead other developers and programmers by creating models, diagrams and flowcharts that instruct them on how to write the necessary code. Their role is vital to solving complex problems within the Salesforce platform and is valued highly by all users of the platform.
Why is a Salesforce Developer role so interesting?
Anyone interested in programming will find a Salesforce Developer role extremely interesting. The Salesforce Developer role allows you to develop and test code as well as get involved in the design process alongside the architecture team to create leading designs.
Without Salesforce developers, thousands of businesses would lack the ability to improve their software, apps and systems with Salesforce-based solutions. Providing solutions and helping businesses achieve their goals makes this job extremely rewarding.
How to land a Salesforce Developer role?
The interview process for a Salesforce Developer job often involves technical vetting in the form of an online test. In some cases, candidates will be required to provide a piece of code based on a technical requirement and discuss their solution, approach and reasoning. Salesforce Developer jobs are therefore suitable for an individual with experience as a developer.
In terms of hard skills, Salesforce Developers should be proficient with declarative and non-declarative development, lightning web components, user acceptance testing and quality assurance. They should also be able to write Apex code, manage large datasets and understand API technologies such as REST and SOAP.
Desirable soft skills for a Salesforce Developer include excellent attention to detail, problem solving skills, ability to identify and follow the best practices, strong written communication, documentation and the ability to interpret client briefs into technical specifications.
What does progression look like for a Salesforce Developer?
Salesforce Developers often come from a web developer background or computer science degree. It is common for Salesforce Developers to start out in Salesforce Admin jobs and end up being drawn into writing code and pursuing Salesforce Developer jobs.
More often than not, Salesforce Developers will stay within a development role and progress up this Salesforce career avenue. However, if the individual is quite confident in a client facing position they may be inclined to move into Salesforce Tech Lead or Salesforce Technical Architect positions.
Salary expectations for a Salesforce Developer?
The average Salesforce Developer salary in the UK is dependent on the industry sector, role complexity, experience of the Salesforce talent and number of Salesforce certifications held. Whether the candidate has experience working in the Salesforce partner or Salesforce customer side may also impact the Salesforce Developer salary.
Salesforce Developers typically go into contracting and the average day rate for contractors is around £500-£700 depending on the Salesforce talent’s level of experience. Alternatively, permanent in-house Salesforce Developers with relevant Salesforce certifications and at least 5 years of experience in the Salesforce platform would be at the higher end of the salary bracket of £60k-£85k.
