Salesforce Lightning: Instant Search Enhancements

Salesforce Lightning: Instant Search Enhancements

The beginning of the autumn season might conjure excitement about pumpkins and hayrides for most people, but for us here at TopLine Results, we look forward to the changing seasons, because that means that a new Salesforce release is just around the corner!

This year's winter release is scheduled for the beginning of October, and with it comes dozens and dozens of new features to help users work in their Salesforce org more efficiently. 

Our team at TopLine Results has been busy testing new Sales Cloud Lightning features during the pre-release period, and while it is impossible to choose a favorite, I have pinpointed one feature area from the Winter '18 release which has definitely helped me be a smarter and quicker user of my Salesforce database. 

Salesforce has implemented enhancements to instant results in the search toolbar, which helps us find the records we are looking for even faster than before – something I know any CRM user, Salesforce or otherwise, will appreciate.   

First, spelling correction has arrived in instant results!   

We have all experienced the frustration of trying to search for a record in our database, but not finding what we are looking for because of a misspelling. Previously misspelled search terms would return no results. However, now when executing a search, Salesforce will check the first term in your search string and provide results which match the corrected spelling of the term.  I have found this to be a valuable feature when I misspell a term because I am typing too quickly (see image below) or can’t quite remember exactly how to spell someone's last name.  As we can see in the image below, even though I have missed a letter (the “o”) in my search for the TopLine account record, instant results has still provided me with the records I was looking for.

Lightning Search, Spell Check

The other time-saving improvement to instant search results is the associated account search, which is the ability to search on the combination of a contact and account name to find the correct contact record.  We have all faced the challenge of searching for a contact record, only to find that there are several different contact records in our database who have the same name, each associated to completely different accounts.  In the image below, I have searched for a contact, only to find that there is more than one contact by that name in my database. Which one is the contact from the account TopLine Results?  We lose productivity and focus when we have to click through all the records until we find the correct record.

Lightning Seach, Across Tables

Starting with this release, if we know the name of the account a contact is associated with, we can include that account name as a term in our search with part or all of the contact's name to instantly surface the correct record.  Now when a contact from a specific account calls in, and we need to pull up their record quickly, we are able to do so in an instant by simply typing in their name and account name.  As I have highlighted in the image below, it is not even necessary to include a last name, which is a great time saver as we don’t have to halt the progress of a phone call to stop and have the contact spell out their last name.

Ligtning Search, Spell Check

The other fantastic feature of instant search is that these two enhancements can work together. In the example pictured below, I have misspelled the contact's last name and included the associated account name, and instant search has still surfaced the correct record!

Lightning Search, Spell Check, Across tables

The new and improved instant search results features I have discussed here are just some of many useful productivity-enhancing features included in this round of Salesforce updates.  Look for future posts about other features we can utilize in Salesforce, which enable us to work more effectively. To learn more about Salesforce or other CRM options, or to receive a personal demonstration, contact TopLine Results at info@toplineresults.com.

About the Author
Jennifer Scheidegger is a CRM Consultant for TopLine Results.  Jen specializes in developing CRM databases for clients and supporting Microsoft Dynamics 365, Salesforce and Pardot.


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