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Architects have a wide variety of skills across multiple domains, like administrators, developers, and analysts. These three types of architects are generally called enterprise architects, solution architects, and technical architects. However, there are some distinctions and similarities between the types of architects in terms of their responsibilities and functions.
As per the job site Ziprecuiter, average salary of a Salesforce Architect in the the average annual pay for a Salesforce Architect in the United States is $159,016 a year.
What is the difference between B2B and B2C models?
There are two options for solution architects in Salesforce: B2B Solution Architect and B2C Solution Architect.
B2B refers to selling products or services to businesses, either directly or indirectly. It can be done through face-to-face interactions, telemarketing, or electronic channels. These businesses (or Business Units) in that company may employ hundreds of thousands of people, and numerous departments and sub-business could be within it. As a result, there are multiple roles, stakeholders, and in some cases a complex organization hierarchy. There could be a lot of change with people joining, departing, and changing roles. As a result you need to constantly evolve to cater to the business needs of these organizations.
In comparison, B2C companies sell products directly to consumers. This particular client has high expectations and is very capable. For instance, if the customer is shopping for car insurance, they would be browsing through various websites, looking at reviews, asking their friends and family. In short, they are gathering information to make a decision. On the other side, this means various touch points on a marketing platform, and the whole life cycle of an individual making a purchase, tracking purchase, returns if needed, leaving reviews. It is important for the business to keep track of the individual during these touch points.
Often companies play in both markets. For example Amazon can sell directly to consumers through its marketplace. They also cater to a different segment of hosting products from other businesses. A different business model which has gained popularity recently is B2B2B or B2B2C. A good example of B2B2B would be providing cloud services like Heroku, AWS, Azure. B2B2C could be brick and mortar stores selling multi-branded clothing merchandise like H&M.
Architects role is diverse
Before discussing the differences between business-to-business (B2B) and business-to-consumer (B2C) architecture, let’s take a broader view.
Systems created by a Salesforce solution architect offer top-notch customer experiences and substantial financial benefits. Additionally, an architect provides direction in three crucial areas.
Business expertise: In this arena, architects must guide their organization through the development of multi-cloud solutions and emphasize the need for providing customers with unique customer experience that sets them apart from the competition
Delivery expertise: An architect offers guidance on multi-cloud implementation issues and suggests best practices in light of their experience delivering use cases.
Technical expertise: A multi-cloud product’s features are selected by an architect based on how well they support the mission and objectives of a business.
A solution architect may not always be thoroughly familiar with all of a company’s systems. However, they act as a liaison between the business and technology to ensure everyone is speaking the same technology language.
They know how to integrate all of these different cloud solutions into one unified system because they’ve worked with various Salesforce clouds, applications, and features before.
Businesses can build value-driven connections with their customers, whether end users, other companies, or a combination of the two, with the support of that sole source of truth and top-notch customer experiences.
Salesforce Sales Cloud and Experience Cloud Practice Exams on SALE
Practice Exams
Similarities between B2B and B2C solutions architect
It’s not always evident where B2B and B2C part ways. A B2B corporation frequently aims to enter the B2C market and vice versa. A B2C or B2B solution architect can create expandable and flexible solutions to satisfy a company’s present and future demands thanks to their understanding of many clouds and domain expertise.
Regardless of B2B or B2C, there is a lot of overlap in the duties performed by a solution architect. Both B2C and B2B solution architect are able to:
- Analyze business processes and create a customer experience solutions to meet these business requirements.
- Use visuals to create the technology solution to help their teams become more aligned and clear.
- Explain the technical aspects of the system to an audience who doesn’t know anything about technology.
- Help create a broad strategy for company solutions to meet the company’s vision and business value goals.
- Create an effective architecture for the end-state of the multi-cloud use case.
- Lead implementation teams through test cases and best practices for multi cloud integrations.
So, what’s the right answer?
So far we have talked about the similarities, but why make a distinction between B2B and B2C at all?
Because depending on the model they utilize, firms sell to their clients in various ways and with multiple items. An architect’s solutions are always centered on the client. In order to thrive in today’s competitive arena companies does much more than merely provide goods and services to clients. A corporation engages with customers through various products and channels, whether B2B or B2C, to market to, assist, and enable them. Additionally, every business requires a thorough, 360-degree perspective of its clients.
Both Salesforce B2B commerce and Salesforce B2B sales enablement solutions play a role in the whole puzzle but they’re not just about either one. For example – a multi-cloud CPQ/multi-cloud B2B orders management expert is someone who has expertise in cloud-based B2B solution architecture for both CPQ (Customer Portals) and B2B Orders Management. On the flip side, if you’re a B2C solution architect, you’re most likely to be considering multi-cloud journey planning and the customer support experience. A B2C Solution architect must know the key Salesforce features such as Service Cloud, Sales Cloud, Experience Cloud, Commerce Cloud, Tableau, Marketing Cloud, Heroku and many more.
In both cases, businesses are using the same services that underpin the Customer 360 platform, like analytics, Einstein and privacy. You’re just using them differently.
Conclusion
A solution architect develops multi-cloud solutions that assist businesses in cultivating relationships with their clients, whether B2B or B2C. Businesses need a wide range of skills when they hire an architect. They emphasize domain understanding, salesforce product knowledge, data strategies, and integrations. By creating frictionless customer experiences powered by a single source of truth, a solution architect ultimately aids companies in making the most of their Salesforce investment.
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