Top 10 Salesforce.org Community Highlights from 2020

By Lizzy Roberts January 14, 2021

I don’t have to tell you, but 2020 was quite a year! Despite all the hardships that COVID-19 brought last year in 2020, there is still a lot to be thankful for because of our amazing Salesforce.org community. It was so inspiring to see the community come together to support one other: we saw virtual sprints with attendees from around the globe, community groups meeting virtually for the first time, and community members stepping up to help and support each other.

I know everyone’s probably ready to dive into 2021 and leave 2020 behind…but before we do that, let’s take a look at the top 10 highlights from the Salesforce.org community. These highlights run the gamut and include things like product updates, important announcements, and community milestones.

Power of Us Hub Community highlights infographic

1. Awesome New Salesforce.org Products, Features, Fixes, and Updates

In April 2020, we announced new innovations in Salesforce.org Nonprofit Cloud that would help nonprofits fund and run their missions in changing times. These new capabilities are designed to help nonprofits better connect with supporters across channels, maximize staff productivity, and ensure transparency between fundraising, finance, and programs.

Learn more about a few of the new products and features we introduced last year:

Additionally, as of November 2020, the Salesforce.org pricing page was updated and we provided a pricing guide PDF with Salesforce.org product pricing included. The community had been asking for pricing transparency around Salesforce.org products — and this announcement addressed exactly that!

2. SFDC Platform Releases

We’re proud to deliver hundreds of innovative features to you three times a year during our seasonal releases: Spring, Summer, and Winter. Check out the platform releases that were announced last year and resources specific to support Salesforce.org customers.

Winter ‘21 Release: Notes
Summer ‘20 Release: Notes, Webinar Recording & Trailhead
Spring ‘20 Release: Notes, Webinar Recording
Stay in the loop on all upcoming release info in the Release Readiness group in the Hub

3. Open Source Community

Check out the Highlights from our March and September 2020 Virtual Community Sprints. We never imagined virtual sprinting would be so amazing!

In addition to the highlights above, we introduced Mini Sprints, which are smaller scale, project-specific one-day Sprint events. The Summit Events App, Diversity, Equity & Inclusion, and NPSP Videography Teams participated in 2020.

And we can’t forget Ombudsman Cloud Care, which went live in August! Now Naval Ombudsman volunteers can organize their data, log case data, and measure impact like never before with the power of Salesforce.

Interested in learning more about this incredible community? Follow the Open Source Commons & Community Sprint Hub group for information on upcoming events in 2021.

Image from the Open Source Community “Mini” #SFDOSprint for NPSP Videography!
They sure are spooktacular! | Credit: Jace Bryan.

4. Hub Happenings and Community Milestones

A few highlights from 2020 in the Power of Us Hub, the online community for Salesforce.org customers and partners.

Hub Ideas and IdeaExchange: Power of Us Hub Ideas moved to the Trailblazer Community IdeaExchange in November, 2020. Help us prioritize leading NPSP and EDA ideas beginning January 18!
Impact Labs: Together with 19 community fellows and 17 pro bono volunteers, we ran the first ever Impact Labs focused on Housing and Homelessness – distilling our community’s input on opportunities for change and building our first open-source solution, Service Match. More information on Service Match to come soon!
2020 Class of Salesforce MVPs. The 2020 Class of Salesforce MVPs was announced on March 10, 2020 — congratulations, everyone! Join the conversation in the Hub. Stay tuned for the 2020 Class of MVPs coming soon.
Language Groups in the Hub: French, German, Dutch, Spanish — see group details for localized content in each language.
…stay tuned for more important community updates and changes coming in 2021!

5. Fundraising and Engagement

Here are just a few of the many community content highlights from 2020 that were focused on fundraising and engagement:

Trailhead: Engage Constituents with Nonprofit Cloud
Webinar Series: Get Started with Fundraising
Recording: Upgrading to the latest NPSP: Why Should I Care?

6. Program Management and Impact

When we’re talking about Hub highlights for 2020, some of the best ones featured program management and impact.

Product Update: Program Management Module
Trailhead: Program Management with Nonprofit Cloud
Webinar Series: Manage Programs with Nonprofit Cloud

7. Healthy Org and Security

In a rapidly evolving digital world, security is more important than ever. Here are a few highlights centered around this critical component of your Salesforce platform.

Workbook: The Healthy Org Workbook
Recording: The Building Blocks for Your Safe and Secure Salesforce Platform
Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA): Meet the Multi-Factor Authentication Assistant article and Recording

8. K-12

There are many sectors that were spotlighted in 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic, but few more so than education. For K-12 in particular, driving equity and minimizing the education gap was top of mind for many.

9. Higher Education

From K-12 to higher education. In the world of post-secondary education, recruitment and admissions, Salesforce.org Education Cloud, and Education Data Architecture were front and center in 2020.

Webinar Series: Admin Basics and Optimize Your Org for Education Cloud
Workbook: Get Started with Education Data Architecture (EDA)
Trailhead: Install Education Data Architecture (EDA) into a Trailhead Playground
Trailhead: EDA Configuration and Data Import

Thank you to the Higher Ed Advisory Council for all your work in 2020! Also, special thank you to Kathy Lueckeman who ran the Higher Ed Office Hours — we are forever grateful for all the work our higher ed leaders contribute to the community!

10. Events

Even in an unexpectedly virtual world, there was no shortage of incredible Salesforce.org events. Here are a few of our favorites:

Dreamforce to You 2020: Trailblazers Together Community Video
Higher Ed Summit 2020: Congrats to the Community Champion award winner, Haley Gould!
Pro Bono Week 2020: 86 organizations from all over the world took part in Pro Bono Quick Connect sessions. During these 60-minute consultations, organizations spoke one-on-one with a Salesforce volunteer about their digital needs and challenges. Wondering how pro bono can help your organization? Here are 5 Ways Nonprofits Built Digital Capacity Through Pro Bono.

Salesforce.org Trailblazers Together event! We couldn’t be together in person, but that didn’t stop the fun!

Thank you for your resilience, determination and passion. Let’s go, 2021!

TAKE ME TO THE HUB

We want your feedback! Hop in the Hub and post to Hub Feedback and tell us what your top community highlights from 2020 were.

From, Your Salesforce.org Community Team

The Power of Us Hub is an online community for Salesforce.org customers, certified partners and staff. The Hub is a place for you to get answers, build your Salesforce skills, share your expertise & connect with others in the nonprofit, higher ed & K-12 sectors who are using Salesforce!

About the Author

Lizzy Roberts, Lead Community Manager at Salesforce.org, has worked in community roles for the past 8+ years. Since joining Salesforce.org in 2017, she has led global operational activities, focusing on fostering engagement and building scalable global programs for the community. Follow her on Twitter at twitter.com/imalizzzard.