Digital experiences can make or break how people feel about your business. When someone visits your portal, looks for help, or tries to complete a simple task, they expect the process to feel smooth. The moment it does not, you lose their attention. That is the reality every modern business faces today.
Salesforce Experience Cloud offers a way to change that. It brings your customers, employees, and partners into one space where information is easy to find and communication actually works. Instead of dealing with disconnected tools and scattered touchpoints, your users get a clear path to what they need.
With the right Salesforce implementation services, companies can set up Experience Cloud in a way that aligns with their goals and provides a seamless experience across all touchpoints.
In this guide, we explore Experience Cloud, the features that set it apart, and the real value it creates for businesses that want to build reliable and user-friendly digital experiences.
What is Salesforce Experience Cloud?
Salesforce Experience Cloud is a secure online platform that helps a business create one place where different people can interact. Customers can use the platform to find information, ask for help, or manage their activity with the company. Inside the same space, employees handle tasks and communication, so the customer receives consistent experience. Partners also use this environment and get controlled access to the tools and details they need to support joint work.
Experience Cloud came into being when businesses started looking for a better way to stay connected with people outside their company. Many organizations were using different tools for customer support, partner communication, and online engagement, which created gaps in overall experience. Salesforce noticed this challenge and introduced a single online environment where all interactions could take place together. This idea later shaped the platform now known as Experience Cloud.
This platform runs on Salesforce Customer 360, which brings all information together. Because of this foundation, it works smoothly with Sales Cloud for managing customer details. It also works with Service Cloud for support operations and connects with Slack for quick internal communication. If a company uses other systems, the platform can link with those as well, allowing everything to stay connected.
How Experience Cloud supports your operations
- It creates clear and organized online spaces that match the needs of each user group.
- A support portal can guide customers through their service issues step by step.
- A knowledge center offers helpful articles and resources that users can access any time.
- A partner section provides outside teams with a simple place to manage joint work.
All areas stay connected inside one platform, so users can interact, share information, and complete tasks without confusion.
Salesforce Experience Cloud features
Now that you know what Salesforce Experience Cloud is, it’s time to go through its top features and see how they support better customer experiences.
1. Personalization
Customers are more likely to choose a brand that gives them personal experience. When a brand feels relatable, engagement and loyalty grow faster. To achieve this, it is important to understand each customer’s past purchases, interests, behavior, and needs.
Salesforce Experience Cloud helps businesses interact better with customers, clients, and remote teams. Its personalization tools make it easier to create experiences that feel more relevant to each user group.
With the help of built-in AI, the platform can suggest interest groups and share useful, personalized information with customers and teams. This helps keep them more engaged and connected to the business.
2. Customization with experience builder
Experience Builder helps you create a customer experience that reflects your brand. It provides ready-made templates. You can build a user interface without writing code, upload your logo, set up your colour style, and add your content. After these steps, your portal becomes ready for use. Each portal can match the look and feel of your organization.
3. Business integration
Experience Cloud supports strong connections with third-party systems. This allows the platform to share data across different tools. Various business solutions can link directly into the system to increase its overall capability. Key processes become easier to connect, including sales, service, marketing, and product development. As a result, information moves smoothly across the organization.
This feature also improves how users interact with the business. Customers get a simpler way to submit their cases. Partners gain a clearer path to qualify leads and explore new opportunities. Over time, these integrations help create a smart and meaningful experience for every user.
Benefits of Salesforce Experience Cloud
Let’s look at the main benefits of Experience Cloud and see how they can support your business goals.
1. Increased customer self-service
Experience Cloud gives customers easy access to helpful resources. They can check FAQs, read articles, or join community conversations to get answers quickly, which reduces their dependence on support staff.
2. Enhanced user experience
Experience Cloud makes it easier for businesses to create a user-friendly environment. Through adjustments in content, structure, and functionality, users get a smoother and more enjoyable experience. A well-planned UI/UX design can greatly refine this experience by making each interaction clearer, faster, and more intuitive.
3. Collaboration and community building
Many people now work from different places, so staying connected is important. Experience Cloud helps by giving businesses online spaces where everyone can come together. Employees, customers, and partners can talk, share ideas, and collaborate on projects.
4. Streamlined processes and efficiency
Experience Cloud works as a single platform that connects with Salesforce tools. This allows businesses to manage customers, service issues, and other important tasks more smoothly and with less effort.
5. Data-driven insights
Experience Cloud shares useful data that helps businesses learn more about their users. It shows engagement levels, content performance, and other details that support better decision-making.
Salesforce Experience Cloud vs. Community Cloud
Many people ask if Salesforce Experience Cloud is the same as Salesforce Communities. The short answer is yes. The product has changed names over the years, but the core idea has stayed the same.
Salesforce first introduced Chatter in 2010 as a tool to help users collaborate inside the platform. A few years later, in 2014, Salesforce expanded on this idea and launched Community Cloud. This new product allowed businesses to create portals, websites, and knowledge centers, with Chatter already included as part of the experience.
In 2021, Salesforce renamed Community Cloud to Experience Cloud. The new name showed that the platform had grown beyond simple communities. It now supports broader digital transformation across portals, customer sites, partner sites, and more.
You can discover additional differences in Salesforce Experience Cloud features compared to Community Cloud and other changes in the table below:
| Feature | Community Cloud | Salesforce Experience Cloud |
| Focus and scope | Online communities for service and collaboration | Diverse digital cloud experiences including communities, portals, and apps |
| Key components | Community builder, Chatter, knowledge base, moderation tools | All Community Cloud features plus CMS, Salesforce analytics, and personalization tools |
| Target audience | External audiences (customers, partners) | Both internal and external audiences |
| Customization | Limited options | Highly customizable with code and visual tools |
| Integration | With Salesforce data and other systems | Tighter integration with Salesforce and broader systems |
| Pricing | Separate license required | Included in Experience Cloud license, with various tiers |
Conclusion
Salesforce Experience Cloud brings all your important interactions into one place. It helps customers find answers without confusion, gives teams a clearer way to work, and creates a space where partners can stay involved. When everything connects in one platform, the overall experience becomes smoother and more helpful for everyone who uses it.
Curious about how Experience Cloud might fit into your world? Send a message to [email protected], and the team at Xavor will help you map things out in a simple and honest way.