To get you placed in the Salesforce ecosystem as an admin, achieving a Salesforce administration certification helps a lot. A Salesforce Administration Certification is one of the highest forms of recognition a Salesforce Administrator can achieve. The certification demonstrates that you have proper Salesforce administration training along with expertise as well as a commitment to the platform. However, cracking the Salesforce Administration Certification is not a cakewalk. It needs a lot of hard work as well as smart preparation with lots of practice, Salesforce administration training sessions, mock exams, quizzes, and a lot more which we will discuss in this blog.
But before we discuss how to pass the Salesforce administration certification exam, let’s know more about the exam.
Which Salesforce administration certification is right for you?
Before you jump into a Salesforce admin course, know what Salesforce offers all certifications. Depending on the roles and responsibilities, Salesforce offers five administrator credentials to its candidates.
- Administrator: This for the professionals who have Salesforce experience and continuously look forward to contributing to additional features and capabilities.
- Advanced administrator: This is for seasoned Salesforce administrator who knows advanced Salesforce features and functionalities that could be applied for different business cases.
- CPQ Specialist: This is for Salesforce CPQ implementation specialist.
- Marketing Cloud administrator: This is for the Salesforce admins who can configure marketing cloud products.
- Platform app builder: Ideal for Salesforce administrator who can write a custom application.
So, based on your role, decide which one is the best suited for you. But Salesforce administration certification is the first leap you need to take as a prerequisite of the other exams.
About the Salesforce administration certification exam details
Exam snippet
- Content: 60 multiple-choice/multiple-select questions and 5 non-scored questions
- Time allotted to complete the exam: 105 minutes
- Passing score: 65%
- Registration fee: USD 200 plus applicable taxes as required per local law
- Retake fee: USD 100 plus applicable taxes as required per local law
- Delivery options: Proctored exam delivered onsite at a testing center or in an online proctored environment.
- References: No hard-copy or online materials may be referenced during the exam.
- Prerequisite: None required; course attendance highly recommended
Exam outline
- Organizational Setup: 3%
- User Setup: 7%
- Security and Access: 13%
- Standard and Custom Objects: 14%
- Sales and Marketing Applications: 14%
- Service and Support Applications: 13%
- Activity Management and Collaboration: 3%
- Data Management: 10%
- Analytics—Reports and Dashboards: 10%
- Workflow/Process Automation: 8%
- Desktop and Mobile Administration: 3%
- AppExchange: 2%
Taking the Certification Online Versus Onsite
You can attempt your Salesforce administration certification exam either online or onsite. These are –
- Online Proctoring
- Onsite Proctoring
Each method has its benefits and drawbacks.
Online proctoring: It provides the advantage of taking the exam from the comfort of your own home. At the same time, it emphasizes your added responsibility to make sure the exam is conducted uninterruptedly from your end and have the necessary equipment and testing space. The exam is conducted in a secure app on your computer where you must be on with webcams and screen sharing to make sure you are taking it correctly.
Onsite proctoring: You don’t have to take any overburden of taking the exam on your own in this mode. Instead, you step into a proctored examination center and focus on the exam material.
Hence, the disadvantages of taking the Salesforce Administrator Certification Exam onsite are obvious:
- You don’t have the option to get the luxury of testing in your own space.
- There are possibilities of minor distractions at the test place that can distract you.
- The availability of onsite testing centers has a limitation based on the geographic location or other restrictions.
How do you get prepared for the Salesforce administration certification training?
Now that you have the course and exam details at your hand, it’s time to plan for the exam preparation. Along with the proper study, you need to pitch in the areas that are the exam’s pain areas. So, self-study may not always be the right guide. Salesforce recommends a mixture of Salesforce admin course training, study materials, and hands-on experience to prepare for the exam. As part of the preparation, you will not see much impact on your practical experience, so you need some of the best training and guidance recommendations along with some insight from industry experts.
Trailhead: Salesforce training
Trailhead is one of the most sophisticated learning portals globally and has a number of online and instructor-led training courses that are essential when studying for the Admin Certification.
There’s a massive 35 hours of training materials available at this Salesforce Admin Trailmix, all of which are available to access online through the Trailhead portal. However, depending on your individual circumstances and your budget, you may find that you benefit from more traditional courses.
Obtain a Salesforce admin course online
Going through Salesforce administration certification material is a huge task. So, to cover the course outline in a stipulated timeframe, it is better to study a customized course. Other advantages of such courses are they conduct instructor-led live sessions along with real-world case studies. This type of study plan helps you achieve the certification goals and make you job-ready.
Instructor-led training
With instructor-led training, you can get the benefit of a 1:1 training scope. It makes it easier to clarify the concepts and your queries.
Use Salesforce Admin flashcards
This is a very effective method of remembering the concepts. You can use flashcards of key concepts instead of attempting to digest a whole collection of questions and answers from Salesforce Certified Administrator mock tests. As part of your Salesforce admin course, you can get these flashcards that break questions down into small flashcards. This is a steady way of preparation.
Mock tests
Practice a lot through mock tests and quizzes to get the actual flavor of the virtual exam. These exams will ask valid questions and record your response time to give you an insight into exam conditions.
Practice previous certification dumps
Although previous years’ Salesforce administration certification exam questions and answers cannot be a replacement for studying our recommended resources, they can be extremely useful. It allows you to observe how questions are framed, the validity of other multiple-choice answers that sit alongside the correct answer, and also will enable you to approach a 60-question exam. A test of that length can be quite daunting, after all.
Final verdict
So you register to take the Salesforce Administration Certification exam, map out your plan for exam preparation, and study for weeks using a variety of official and community resources. Now the only thing between you and this exam is the question, ‘am I ready?’ While mock tests are a helpful way of measuring how prepared you are for the exam, there will always be a leap of faith. But don’t be afraid to gamble on yourself; if you put the work in, you should have no problems demonstrating your knowledge in the exam.