Summer ’17 Release Features Overview for Admins

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Salesforce continues to deliver new cool Lightning Experience enhancements with the Summer ‘17 release. The list below just barely scratches the surface of the many, many features will make you and your users more productive in Lightning Experience. For the complete list of enhancements, visit the Summer ‘17 Release Notes. You can also tune into Release Readiness Live Friday, June 2 to learn more about cool features for Admins.

Lightning Features for Your Users

  • When leads are converted, the files and related records associated with the lead will now be associated with the resulting contact, account, person account and opportunity records. This is helpful because the files and related records are associated with the correct records and reps don’t need to do this manually.
  • Field history related lists now appear in Lightning. This closes a feature gap. Now end users and system administrators can see field changes in Lightning as they are able to in page layouts in Classic.
  • Users can find duplicates between contacts and leads when they create lead or contact records. This helps you identify when you may already have a record for the same person in Salesforce. (Note: This requires the setup of standard duplicate rules for contacts and leads.)
  • Users can use Classic text, custom HTML, and letterhead email templates in Lightning Experience in addition to Lightning templates. Prior to Summer 17, Lightning users could only access Lightning communication templates for use, which meant we had to replicate the templates created in Classic in Lightning Experience. Let’s practice keeping it DRY (‘Don’t Repeat Yourself’), one of my favorite development principles.
  • Increase user productivity. Those using a console app can switch between a list view and a table, and can select to show the list view as a split view. This allows your reps to work with multiple records at a time. 
  • Your service agents will love these new Lightning Service Console enhancements: (1) split console view, (2) compact case feed, (3) drag and drop files, (4) case hovers and (5) omni-channel utility. This console maximizes the available space with the split console view (described in the previous bullet), allows reps to manage cases on one screen, and improves productivity by minimizing the steps needed to add a new file to Salesforce. Additional information is provided to the end user via case hovers, so they don’t need to go to the case details to get quick information on the case record. And lastly, users can access links to important items via the omni-channel utility, such as invoking flow screens. 
  • Service agents can now create, edit and delete case comments in Lightning. Create a quick action and add it to the Case page layout. Prior to Summer 17 in Lightning, case comments were read-only so users needed to switch back to Classic to add, edit or edit case comments. This addresses a feature gap.
  • Smarter search anticipates spelling errors and returns spelling corrected results. We’ve all made mistakes, where we fat fingered during data entry or are unsure of the exact spelling but provided search criteria that is close, but just not an exact match. Salesforce determines that there are similarly named records in accounts, opportunities, etc. and serves up results matching spell-corrected terms.
  • Service reps can see email attachments in a case’s attachment related list. Attachments sent via an email are included in the attachments related list on the case object, denoted by the email icon. Previously, users couldn’t see these in Salesforce. When users View All, attachments from emails are shown like this. It is helpful for a service rep to tell whether attachments are associated to emails received or whether they are sole file attachments manually uploaded into Salesforce.
  • When a user creates a new record using a quick action, the success message includes a link to the record created. This allows the end user to confirm the details of the record post creation. How many of us have created a record only to realize upon save that you left something off and need to modify the record and can’t easily find it? Astro says, “Me.” 
  • Users can drag and drop files into File and Attachments related lists. How cool is this feature? This eliminates several clicks for the user to browse for the file, select to add it and then Salesforce adds the file.

Lightning Features For Admins

There are new Lightning setup features to help you up your administration productivity game!

  • Productivity improvement! Admins can right click to open more items in a new tab from setup, just like you can in Classic. No more single tab to use for Salesforce administration tasks.
  • Editing an object is only a click away. Admins can now edit the object directly when they are on the object page by going to Setup and selecting ‘Edit Object.’
  • OMG, this enhancement is HUGE to admins! Object Manager got a face lift. Object Manager gets its own tab and left nav (just like the one you know and love in Classic). No more navigating to Object Manager, then locating the object, clicking on the specific object and locating the various related object items, such as validation rules, record types, etc.

For more great resources on the upcoming Summer ‘17 release, visit the links below:

If you are still on Classic and are thinking about whether you are ready for the move, access the Lightning Experience Migration Assistant in Setup. The assistant tool provides links to “Learn” about LEX, “Check Readiness”, “Preview”, “Optimize with Features”, “Set Up Users” and “Turn It On.” In the “Set Up Users” section, you can specify which users you are going to switch to LEX.

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