Creating a new Salesforce report: Step-by-step instructions
Introduction
Creating reports in Salesforce is a great tool that allows you to structure large amounts of data and display information in the format and volume that you need. Reports allow you to gain insights from data, track performance and make informed decisions based on this data. If you are new to Salesforce or have been working with this platform for a long time, but have not come across reports or have forgotten the main points, then this guide has been prepared especially for you.
After reading this article, you will remember or find out what types of reports exist, what are the main elements of the report, what steps you need to take before creating a report, how to create and modify a report, apply filters and groupings, what mistakes you may encounter and how to avoid them. But I assure you, there is nothing difficult in creating reports, and we will see this now.
1. Understanding Salesforce Reports
Salesforce reports are lists of records that meet certain criteria and are displayed in rows and columns. The reports are very easy to set up and are used to analyze data, monitor key performance indicators, track sales pipelines, and understand customer behavior. This is a very convenient and visual display of the most important data, or only the data that you want to see or analyze.
There are 4 types of reports in Salesforce:
Tabular reports: Simple lists of records without any grouping. This type of report is best suited for tasks such as displaying a list of phone numbers or email addresses of Contacts or Opportunities that have been created over the past month.
Summary reports: Grouping records by one or more fields. They are well suited for subtotals, they allow you to count totals by groups. For example, for the Employees object, make the first grouping by employee gender, and the second grouping by employee age. And so the report will show us, for example, that the company employs 138 men aged 30 to 40, 201 women aged 40 to 50, and so on.
Matrix reports: Reports grouped by rows and columns - on the X and Y axis. It is ideal for comparing values in two dimensions. For example, for the Employees object, we can group by gender by row and group by age by column. As a result, we will be able to compare the results and see that the company employs 138 men and 125 women aged 30 to 40, 187 men and 201 women aged 40 to 50, and so on.
Combined reports: They contain several blocks of reports that display various data next to each other. They allow you to analyze data from different objects, for example, from Accounts objects and their Opportunities.
2. Report Builder Interface Overview
The interface of the Salesforce report constructor is designed so that the user can conveniently work with the data visually and flexibly customize what information is displayed and how. The following are the main components of the Salesforce Reports:
1) Report Type
The first thing you need to choose when building a report is its type. It determines which objects and its fields will be available to you when creating the report.
For example, the standard "Opportunities" Report Type will give access to the fields of the Opportunities object, and the "Leads with Campaigns" Report Type will give access to leads and their association with marketing campaigns.
2) Filters Pane
Allows you to set the conditions by which the records in the report will be selected and includes basic filters such as, for example, "Created Date", "My Records"), and also allows you to configure additional conditions. You can also use logical operators (AND, OR), filtering by field values, date ranges and so on.
3) Outline Pane
Here you can add or remove report columns by selecting them from the list of fields of the object(s) that you are analyzing. You can set up field groupings as well (for Summary or Matrix Reports). In this area you are also able to set formulas and configure calculated fields.
4) Preview Pane (Preview Area)
This area, which takes up most of the screen, displays what your report will look like. If you would like to, you can configure the report to be updated automatically in real time, immediately after you make changes just by selecting the "Update Preview Automatically" option. This allows you to immediately see the effect of the applied filters, grouping, and structure changes.
It is an interactive tool, meaning you can click on records and view related data.
All these four panels work synchronously, which helps to build a logical and visual report quickly without the need for coding or complex manipulations.
3. Preparing to Build Your Report
Before you start creating a report, you need to consider the following points:
1) Define your objective: what question are you trying to answer? For example, it might be a question: "How many new leads have each sales representative created this month?"
2) Select the correct report type: the report types determine which records and fields are available. You can use standard report types or create custom ones.
For example, if you have already done most of the work on configuring your report, and then in the process realized that you need data from another object that is not in the report type you have selected, then you will have to create anew a report that will include this object and do all the work from the very beginning.
3) Know your data: examine the relationships of objects and the available fields. Make sure that your user's role has access to all the data necessary for the report.
4. Creating Your First Report: A Step-by-Step Guide
- Navigate to the Reports Tab or select "Reports" from the App Launcher.
- Click “New Report”. This will launch the Report Builder.
- Select a Report Type. For example, it can be "Leads" to analyze lead data.
- Apply Filters. Default filters like "My leads" and "Created Date" may be applied. Adjust the filters as needed and create filter logic if necessary. For example, you can change "My Leads" to "All Leads" and set a date range to “Create Date - Last 30 days”).
- Add Columns. Use the Outline panel to add or remove fields. For example, include columns like Lead Owner, Status, Created Date.
- Group Rows (for Summary Reports). For this, drag fields like "Lead Owner" into the grouping section.
- Add a Chart (Optional). Click "Add Chart" and choose a chart type (bar, pie, line).
- Save and Run the Report. For this click "Save & Run". Enter a report name, folder location, and description.
Congratulations, you have just created your first report! Would you agree that it wasn't difficult?
5. Troubleshooting Common Issues
Missing data:
If you are faced with the fact that your report obviously does not display all records, first of all check the filters that are applied to this report. Next, you need to check the field-level security, record ownership.
Incorrect grouping:
Make sure that the fields are grouped consistently and meaningfully.
Performance issues:
If it takes a very long time for your report to be updated, you can limit the number of rows/columns or you can also use filters to reduce the amount of data.
Conclusion
Reports are a user-friendly, intuitive and very useful Salesforce tool. And that's why it's very important to learn how to use it, because this knowledge and skills will help unlock the power of your data. Reports help to provide clarity, make decisions, and help the team focus on what is really important. It will take a little time and practice to get the hang of creating reports and discover even more great useful features, such as subscriptions to reports, scheduling the delivery of reports to the team, sharing reports with other users, roles and groups, and much more. If you need help with Salesforce, fell free to contact us.
