Passing the Salesforce.com Certified Service Cloud Consultant Exam

Posted on April 1, 2011 by | 36 Comments

Recently, Salesforce.com Certification launched its newest line of consulting credentials – the Salesforce.com Certified Service Cloud Consultant. This is especially important as Salesforce continues to expand into the Contact Center / Call Center service industry. In passing the certification exam, I found the following helpful:

  • To get started, watch the Service Cloud 2 demo youtube video
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cpVRaDdtO8U 

  • If you have access to the Partner Portal, login and go through the Service Cloud 2 Sales Kit. This is a great starting point with lots of additional resources, powerpoints and youtube videos. In the Partner Portal go to Sales Resources | Products | Service Cloud Sales Kit
    https://na1.salesforce.com/apex/PP2PartnerPage?p=PP_ServiceCloudSalesKit
    Pay attention to all the adoptions strategies, metrics and reports as there are several questions on the exam about this. Note: if you don’t have a login to the Partner Portal, then sign up for one
    http://www.salesforce.com/partners and ‘Join Now’.
  • Download and Subscribe to the “Service Cloud Enablement Resources” content pack in the Partner Portal. This includes a lot of the current content on Service Cloud 2. Also has the full powerpoint slides. Also in the Partner Portal, review the doc “I Speak Contact Center (Glossary).pdf”. Pay attention here as there are several terms used in the exam. Great stuff.
  • To get access to a Service Cloud 2 demo org, create a test org from the Partner Portal. Then create a Case in the Partner Portal and request for the “Service Cloud User” and “Force.com Flow User” feature licenses. Alternatively, create a Developer org and ask the Account Executive (AE) to add the feature licenses. If you don’t know who your AE is, create a Case.
  • Salesforce.com Certified Service Cloud Consultant | Study Guide
    http://www.salesforce.com/assets/pdf/misc/SG_ServiceCloudConsultant.pdf
  • IMPORTANT: Go through the Service Cloud Implementation and Cheat Sheets as listed here under For Support Professionals and Support Administration https://na1.salesforce.com/help/doc/en/quicktour_tips.htm Pay attention here as most all the questions will come from these implementation guides and cheat sheets.
  • You might also find helpful to breeze through the Salesforce.com Service Cloud For Dummies. While basic, it does a good job pulling everything together and provides some sample use cases.
  • Check out Jeff Douglas’s prep http://blog.jeffdouglas.com/2011/01/26/how-to-pass-the-service-cloud-consultant-exam/
    Most notably you must be familiar with the differences between the portals: self-service portal (SSP), Customer Portal (CP) and the Partner Portal (PP) –make note of the differences in the learning material. As mentioned, know the difference on Setting Up Email-to-Case or On-Demand Email-to-Case. There was an exam question on this.
    https://help.salesforce.com/apex/HTPrint?id=customizesupport_email.htm&language=en&doctype=helpdoc
  • If this isn’t enough for you, then definitely checkout the Salesforce Premier Training. Go to https://login.salesforce.com/?lt=lms and login with your company (or devleoper) login. And look for Release (Summer ’10, Winter ’11, Spring ’11) training sessions. Focus on the Service Cloud modules.
  • Lastly, while I can’t post questions from the exam, here are concepts and keywords in no particular order to study up on: the new salesforce chat client vs Chatter, Article data categories vs Article types, loading Articles via CSV, talk time vs wrap up time, IVR, Knowledge article profile permissions and visibility (roles, data categories), CTI, creating Articles, service console interaction log vs highlights panel,  shift trading, dashboard and running user, report sources (record name, record owner, feed post), force.com flow, division, custom indexes, record types, quality monitoring system, business continuity, ITIL, customer satisfaction (CSAT), case page layout vs closed case page layout, SLA, field service, order management, milestone, deployment and change sets, Knowledge sidebar, knowledge multi-language, entitlements, Ideas, Answers, case teams, and the new softphone located on footer vs left sidebar…

By now you should be an expert and confident going into the exam. Good luck!!!

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  • Raghu

    Thanks for the useful info.
    I’m a certified administrator with 9 months experience . Will I be able to clear ‘Service Cloud’ exam if I go through all the materials ? What is the level of difficulty.
    Thanks

    • http://ben.prozinski.com benprozinski

      Sounds like you have the fundamentals down. Plan to spend at least 16 hours going through all the material. Even as a Salesforce expert with several years of experience in the service and support functional roles, you will not be able to pass without the effort to study here. Not everybody passes the first time, and that’s OK.

      • Raghu

        Thanks for the reply, Ben
        I signed up for the Partner Portal a week back , but still I dont have access to it . Does it take so much time?

        What should I do ? If you could share anything ,it would be really great .Thanks

        • Anonymous

          Hi Raghu when signing up for the partner portal, international addresses may go through an extra step of approval that may take time to get approved. Also, would help to have a domain name with an email address at that domain. And finally check your spam folder. Hope this helps.

          • Anil

            Do we need to pay for signing up partner portal??

  • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_HAEBXICIJ3M4ZTX3QQIQPVBMXY Ernest G.ashcraft

    Great article and links.Thanks for such an informative and useful post.I too want to know the difficulty level of exams.Also what is the basic requirement for this exam?

  • Mariehyde

    I am interested in taking the salesforce.com consultant exam, although I have no experience with this product.  Have past financial institution business analyst experience (accounting degree – inactive CPA).  Can one get a salesforce.com consulting position with no previous experience, even with certificate)?

    • Anonymous

      Yes, a lot of companies and partners of salesforce.com are hiring  rockstars even if they may not have direct product experience. The consultant exam has changed in the last year. It’s now more product focused with two different tracks – Sales and Service. Having BA and industry experience will help a lot. But you really have to learn the product/platform to pass the exam as a lot of the questions are very specific to functionality.

      Best thing to do is to really get started. Signup for a free developer edition which gives you the full functionality to learn http://developer.force.com/

  • Mariehyde

    I am interested in taking the salesforce.com consultant exam, although I have no experience with this product.  Have past financial institution business analyst experience (accounting degree – inactive CPA).  Can one get a salesforce.com consulting position with no previous experience, even with certificate)?

  • Aditya

    Very informative article…. Thanks you posting it. Also I have the partner portal login but when i try to access I Speak Contact Center (Glossary).pdf or Subscribe to  Service Cloud Enablement Resources it shows insufficient privilage… Can you please advice what is required. Thank you in advance

    • Anonymous

      When you sign up, you should do so as a Consulting partner not as an ISV. The content is catered to different audiences and not all will have access to the same content. You should be able to change this in the Partner Portal by clicking on Partner Programs || Consulting Partner Program – Deliver professional Services || Join Now

  • Ashu C

    I’m also preparing for this exam, can you please advise if it is possible to clear it without going through premier training. Does the material in Partner portal suffice? I know it is a difficult question to answer but what do you advise? I’ve gone through a lot of blog posts related  to this exam and my view is that it is quite a different exam in a way that 80% of the exam expect you to know contact/call center methodologies.

    • Ashu_sharma82

      Hi Ben, 

      can you please advise here?

      Thanks,
      Ashu

    • Anonymous

      Hi Ashu – the partner portal is not a necessity by no means to pass the exam. It’s extra material that is nice to have – but tends to be more focused on the selling of the product versus delivering it. Tue, it’s more important to have industry experience and strong product knowledge with Salesforce Service Cloud functionality. 

  • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_Q7XXL637PO3AF4SWAT65OCBBQA sunish

    Did you complete the online premier training tha tis given in the study guide? And, how many hours did you put for its preparation? How did you find the exam initially?

    Sunish

    • Anonymous

      Hi Sunish – Yes, this is highly recommended to complete the online premier training https://login.salesforce.com/?lt=lms. I spent at minimum 16 hours studying for good measure. The exam was similar to all the other certification exams and on par with what I expected as noted by the study guide http://www.salesforce.com/assets/pdf/misc/SG_ServiceCloudConsultant.pdf

      • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_Q7XXL637PO3AF4SWAT65OCBBQA sunish

        Hi Ben. Cleared the exam today. Thanks a lot for your valuable inputs which helped during preparation.

        Thanks,
        Sunish

        • Anonymous

          Congrats!!!

  • Geo

    Hi Ben. I passed my Service Cloud 2 Consultant exam last week, and I found your notes extremely helpful! Thanks for sharing them :)

    • Anonymous

      Awesome!!! Congrats!

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  • Aditya Thakur

    Hi Ben, Cleared Service cloud consultant exam. Thanks for your notes………

    • http://twitter.com/benprozinski Ben Prozinski

      #Awesome congrats, glad to hear it helped.  Feel free to respond if there were any additional tips.

  • Ivan

    Hi Ben,

    Your notes are really useful for the exam! I’ve just passed it.
    I do recommend anyone who is going to take that exam to follow Ben’s      advice.
    Thanks! 

  • Tom Ernest

    Did you also take the new SFDC Sales Cloud Exam? If so, any tips? If not, can you point me to some resources outside of SFDC (I read Jeff Douglas’ blog on the exam, revised material in the study guide, and other material generated internally by SFDC). Thanks.

    • Anonymous

      Hi Tom, yes this in the works! I passed the Sales Cloud exam last month. In the meantime the same approach I took applies but the content. You’ll be the first to know when it’s posted -Ben

  • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_WQ45FB3DZVU22Y42XCLHYW235U Jhon

    Hello everyone!!
    Thanks for providing us such a wonderful tips for effective studying. These tips will be very helpful for those guys who are going to preparefor their examination. I have bookmarked your post because it is a very helpful post:)
    http://www.how-to-study-for-a-test.com

  • Ray

    Hey.!!

    I am planning to give the exam next week or so..I dont have any prior experience in management or customer service. I m trying to grasp the things like how SF handles service process.
    I just want to know that if the exam is more process oriented or detail oriented. Like do i need to focus more on details of what are possible options for a feature or focus on  where i can use that feature.?

    • http://twitter.com/benprozinski Ben Prozinski

      Yes, I have found the exam to be multi-faceted around detailed and process. I’ve seen questions on both product functionality and features and when and how to apply it to different business scenarios. It’s not technical in the sense you’ll be writing logic (not writing formula rules or validation rules), but it’s all multiple choice questions. Several questions may exist around common experiences in managing customer service as well as applying the product (SF) to it. Good luck!

  • http://www.walterelly.com Walter Elly

    Thank you so much for this! FYI your study guide link somehow downloads the sales cloud guide instead of the service cloud guide. Here is an updated link  http://certification.salesforce.com/SG_CertifiedServiceCloudConsultant.pdf

    • http://www.walterelly.com Walter Elly

      UPDATE: Just passed my exam, thank you so much for this blog post it provided excellent guidance!

  • http://www.serenityhunter.com Todd Hash

    Hi Ben!  Thanks for the great information.  I had trouble finding information about “service console interaction log vs highlights panel.”  Can you enlighten me?  Thanks Todd!

  • Kerensen

    Hello , 

    Could you please , explain what shift trading means? i searched in google but i can’t find any definition that i can understand . 
    Thank you !!

    • http://twitter.com/sunish_chabba Sunish Chabba

      Ben, please correct me if I’m wrong here. Tech personnels in Service organizations like BPOs work in shifts according to a weekly or monthly schedule. In case someone is unable to come in a particular shift assigned to him, he can try to find his replacement and ask the person, if trading or exchanging the shift is acceptable to the other person. This mutual agreement is called shift trading.

      • Kerensen

        Thank you ! its now clear for me !

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