Just recently, Salesforce announced that the Salesforce Certified Data Cloud Consultant certification will be available starting September 6, 2023. This news has generated excitement among Salesforce professionals, who now have the opportunity to gain credentials in one of Salesforce’s most sought-after products.
This certification is significant for two main reasons. Firstly, the demand for Data Cloud skills is rapidly increasing, as Data Cloud has become the crucial element that enhances connectivity between various ‘clouds’ across the platform. We can expect more updates during Dreamforce, which is happening next week. Secondly, this credential, which was previously an accreditation exclusive to Salesforce partners, is now available to any Salesforce professional.
Data Cloud Consultant Certification
According to the official Trailhead exam guide, the ideal candidate for this certification is: “Consultants who have experience implementing and consulting on enterprise data platforms in a customer-facing role, including designing, configuring, and architecting solutions.” (Source)
While ‘consultant’ typically brings to mind those working for consultancies, this certification is relevant to many other roles that involve consultative work, such as administrators and other positions responsible for optimizing Salesforce for their organizations. Essentially, anyone who can “meet maintainable and scalable customer business requirements” using Data Cloud is a suitable candidate.
Recommended Experience
The following experience is suggested for those pursuing the certification:
- Two or more years of implementing and working with data strategy and data modeling, including building multiple solutions across Salesforce clouds (broad knowledge).
- Experience (typically) in development, strategy, business analysis, presales solutioning, or architecture.
- Knowledge of Data Cloud capabilities and terminology.
This diverse skill set highlights the need for certified Data Cloud professionals to possess data management, developer, and business analyst skills, among others.
Exam Outline
The exam covers several key areas, summarized as follows:
- Solution Overview (18%)
- Business value, use cases.
- Data Cloud lifecycle and dependencies.
- Data ethics.
- Data Cloud Setup and Administration (12%)
- Permissions.
- Data stream types and data bundles.
- Data spaces use cases and creation.
- General administration.
- Data Explorer, Profile Explorer, and APIs.
- Data Ingestion and Modeling (20%)
- Transformation capabilities (streaming and batch).
- Data ingestion from various sources.
- Defining, mapping, and modeling data for identity resolution.
- Inspecting and validating ingested and modeled data.
- Identity Resolution (14%)
- Matching and rule sets.
- Reconciling data and rule sets.
- Segmentation and Insights (18%)
- Segmentation use cases and maintenance.
- Analyzing segment membership.
- Calculated versus streaming insights.
- Act on Data (18%)
- Activation use cases and troubleshooting.
- Attributes and related attributes.
- Timing dependencies.
- Data actions use cases.
The exam costs $200, similar to other consultant certifications, and can be booked through WebAssessor.
Preparation
To prepare for the exam, start with the Trailmix “Prepare for Your Salesforce Certified Data Cloud Consultant Credential.” A more detailed module will be available soon on Trailhead.
Summary
If you’ve been keeping up with recent developments, you’ll notice that Data Cloud has been prominently featured. This is because Data Cloud has become essential for enhancing connectivity between different ‘clouds’ across the Salesforce platform. In 2023, innovations like Einstein GPT on the Salesforce platform have relied heavily on Data Cloud to improve the results generated from user prompts, embodying the AI + Data + CRM approach that Salesforce promotes.
Register for the exam now via WebAssessor.
