Salesforce - Azure DevOps integration: a step-by-step guide

Introduction

Salesforce and Azure DevOps are among the most popular tools used by enterprises. Salesforce helps organizations manage their customers, marketing campaigns and service requests, while Azure DevOps enables teams to easily handle projects, tasks and processes. A Salesforce Azure integration opens the door to advanced automation and boosts productivity by eliminating manual repetitive tasks.

Integrations not only enhance automation and improve teamwork, but also speed up issue resolutions and boost customer satisfaction.

When the data flows free within the organizations teams, the majority of tasks become significantly easier and less time-consuming. Do you have a clear data flow path in your organization, or do you rely on manual work?

In this guide you will see how you can easily set up a Salesforce Azure integration and create an automated data flow that speeds up issue resolutions and shortens development time. All of this leads to boosted customer satisfaction and ultimately to better business results.

An overview of Salesforce and Azure DevOps

Salesforce is a well-established name among CRM users. It enables organizations to better understand and connect with their customers. Salesforce CRM consists of different modules for sales, marketing, analytics and more. The platform offers thorough customer information and resources in one centralized location.

Main features:

• Managing the customer pipeline, data and interactions in one place.
• Streamlining of complex business processes.
• Detailed monitoring of marketing campaigns and connecting social to marketing, sales and customer service;
• Controlling marketing data and customer journeys across channels.
• Service desk and routing functions to automatically deliver cases and leads to the right employees.
• Real-time reports and dashboards for analytics for every function  sales, customer service, marketing, HR, IT, etc.
• Dynamic visualization engine for engineers and business users.

Azure DevOps is quite popular among developers as it allows dev teams to build faster, automate and manage their tasks and projects. It covers the entire application lifecycle and enables DevOps and agile practices. With Azure DevOps organizations can create software much faster and deploy on cross-platform systems. It is a Microsoft product, previously known as Visual Studio Team Service (VSTS). Currently it consists of 5 separate services that you can use together or individually. These include Azure Boards, Repos, Pipelines, Test Plans and Artifacts.

Main features:

• Version control  allows developers to collaborate on code and track changes.
• Reporting  enables DevOps teams to make informed decisions faster and deliver value to their customers.
• Requirements management  provides a single-source of truth and managing of all requirements in one place.
• Project management  gives each team a set of agile tools to plan and track work.
• Automated builds  makes builds and tests automatic and available to everyone that needs to work on them
• Testing and release management  software engineers can fully automate testing and deployment at multiple stages.

Why integrate Azure DevOps and Salesforce?

A Salesforce Azure integration helps to boost productivity, improve cross-team collaboration and remove bottlenecks by eliminating manual transfer of data.

Azure DevOps is used by a huge percentage of the DevOps teams across enterprises, and Salesforce is one of the best customer relationship management platforms. This is why often they are both present in the set of software tools companies choose.

This means that when a case is created in Salesforce, and it is related to a software bug or a project of the DevOps team, the data from it needs to be transferred to Azure DevOps. While the developers are handling it, communication usually goes back and forth. The sales team communicates with customers, and the marketing team handles campaigns, so they need to be aware of any updates.

The teams are usually working remotely and can be in any part of the world. In order to keep the responsible team members updated, the developers, marketing and sales representatives need to login to multiple platforms and copy paste data manually. This often leads to delays, omitting needed details, errors or faulty data.

An Azure DevOps integration with Salesforce, can help avoid these issues, and instead have all the necessary data delivered to the right people in real time. Here are the major benefits that a Salesforce Azure integration brings:

• Improved collaboration between teams.
• Prompt issue resolutions, leading to boosted customer satisfaction.
• Streamlined problem management.
• Removing manual work, thus minimizing errors and delays.
• Improved productivity and operational efficiency.
• Better visibility into recurring issues, leading to reduced problems and service interruptions

See more details about the Salesforce Azure DevOps integration here.

How to integrate Azure DevOps and Salesforce?

We saw that a Salesforce to Azure DevOps integration has many benefits. However, it might turn out to be quite a difficult task if you do not have the right tools. Choosing an integration platform is critical and you need to consider the specifics of your use case. Here are some of the major things you might want to think about before making your choice for an integration tool:

• Speed  how quickly do you need to complete your integration project? If you want to have it ready soon, it is a good idea to consider a no-code integration platform. If you go with low-code or an internal integration, it might take months as you would need dedicated developers to work on the integration. With a no-code platform you might have the integration ready within a few days.
• Limitations and pricing  check if the integration tool you chose has limitations on number of users, syncs or transferred entities. If you have a large number of cases that need to be transferred from Salesforce to Azure DevOps, or if you have frequent updates that you need to happen in real time, such limitations might be a showstopper for you. You might also be surprised when the price goes significantly up once you surpass the limitation. Check carefully the pricing details.
• Flexibility and scalability  technologies and companies develop so fast nowadays, and you need to make sure your integration tool will be able to scale with you. Check if it supports the newest versions of Salesforce and Azure DevOps. Also will you be able to make changes to your integration, like adding new fields, updates, modifying the correlation logic, etc.
• Security  no one can afford to overlook security, make sure that the integration platform is secure and does not allow potential data gaps or breaches.

In this guide we will show the exact steps for a Salesforce Azure integration with the ZigiOps platform. ZigiOps is completely no-code and with it you can have your integration ready in minutes. At the same time it is super flexible and allows all types of customizations even for the most complex use cases. It can scale as you do, and has no limitations on number of users, syncs or transfers. You have a fixed price that includes absolutely everything, no hidden fees of any sort. ZigiOps is highly secure, it is a stand-alone platform, and does not store any of your data. You can read more about the security details and measure we take here.

ZigiOps benefits

ZigiOps perfectly matches the requirements of enterprises and large organizations for their integrations. Our customers share that they need unlimited connections and syncs, no limitations on the number of users, flexibility and reliability at the same time. Here is why ZigiOps is preferred by lots of big enterprises, including more than 60 of the Fortune 500 companies:

• No-code integrations  even users with no technical background can set integrations. It all happens in a few clicks.
• Advanced data mappings  match all regular, custom and related fields the way you need to, unlimited customizations, filtering and condition settings.
• Scalability and flexibility  create new integrations in minutes and easily update and change the ones you already have.
• Standalone platform  with ZigiOps you do not need to make any changes to your systems, it works via APIs, so no plugins need to be installed.
• Security  we follow the best security standards, the on-premise version of the platform does not have a database and does not store any of your data.
• High availability  ZigiOps supports high availability and guarantees 99.9% uptime, it protects you even if any of your systems goes down.

To learn more about the ZigiOps platform and its benefits, you can visit our product page.

In the next section we will review the most common use cases for an Azure DevOps Salesforce integration. If you have a specific or more complex use case, you can contact our team and book an individual demo. We will show you exactly how it works in your particular use case, and you can start your free trial immediately after that.

See ZigiOps also in the Visual Studio marketplace.

Azure DevOps Salesforce integration use cases

One of the scenarios that is very often met in companies is when Cases created in Salesforce need to be transferred as Work Items in Azure DevOps. Updates in both directions are quite useful as well.

ZigiOps retrieves new cases from Salesforce automatically and logs them as work items in Azure DevOps. The integration platform offers advanced filtering and mapping capabilities, so you can easily define which cases to be transferred and how the specific fields will be mapped and reported to Azure DevOps. With ZigiOps, you can sync regular fields, custom fields, comments, attachments, and more.

When there are any updates in the already transferred Salesforce cases, ZigiOps gets them and logs them to Azure DevOps in real time. The integration is bi-directional so changes in Azure DevOps are also synced in Salesforce instantly. Regular fields, custom fields, lifecycle fields, comments and attachments are synced between the two.

With ZigiOps you can sync all types of Salesforce objects (standard, custom, external) to all types of Azure DevOps work items  user stories, issues, bugs, etc. For example:

Salesforce (Cases) to Azure DevOps (Work Items)

Or

Azure DevOps (Work Items) to Salesforce (Cases)

For more information and use cases, check our dedicated Azure DevOps-Salesforce page.

Initial setup of the Azure DevOps Salesforce integration

For the purposes of this guide, we will take the example of transferring Salesforce cases to Azure DevOps issues. Other entities and data are transferred between Salesforce and Azure DevOps in a very similar way with ZigiOps.

The first step of the integration is to install ZigiOps. It can be either installed on your premises, VM or you can leverage the cloud version of the platform. For the cloud version you can directly log in through theiPaaS portal. For the on-premise version the installation is easy and takes just a few minutes to complete.ZigiOps is a standalone integration platform, and you do not need to make any changes or install any plugins to your Azure DevOps or Salesforce instances.

Once you complete the installation, you can login through the login screen:

As soon as you login, you will see the ZigiOps Dashboard. It provides information on your licenses, integrations, number of transactions between systems, and more.

Connecting to Salesforce

When you login to ZigiOps, the first step to completing your Salesforce Azure DevOps integration is to connect the desired systems to the integration platform. To do this you need to go to the Connected Systems menu, choose your systems and enter the credentials for them. In our example, lets start with Salesforce.

To connect ZigiOps with Salesforce you need to enter the following details:

• Instance URL  the URL where you usually login to Salesforce
• Username  your Salesforce account username

• Password  your password for that username
• Client ID
• Client Secret

You can see a detailed explanation how to find your Client ID and Client Secret here.

Please note your Salesforce account needs to be an administrator one, or an account with Modify All Data permissions.

After entering all the necessary details, ZigiOps will automatically check the connection with the Salesforce system and let you know its successful. When connected, ZigiOps will collect the schema and some metadata from Salesforce. Later, it can load all available fields and show them to you, so you can easily make your integration settings. This makes configuring the Azure DevOps Salesforce integration very easy and straight forward.

Connecting to Azure DevOps

Our second system is Azure DevOps. You need to click on the Add New System button, search for Azure DevOps and add it as a system. After that you would need to fill in the following details to connect it with ZigiOps:

• Azure DevOps instance URL  the URL where you usually login to your Azure DevOps account
• Type of instance  mark if you are using Azure DevOps Service or TFS

• Organization  your organization name, as it appears in Azure DevOps
• Username  your accounts username
• Private access token (or API key)  the token is generated by visiting the Personal Access Tokens functionality and then selecting the + New Tokenbutton in your Azure DevOps account

This is the initial data needed to connect your Azure DevOps instance. However, it can vary according to your use case. In our example we are focusing on transferring Salesforce cases to Azure DevOps issues.

You need to have the following permission for the Azure DevOps instance you are connecting:

• Work Items (READ, WRITE)
• Create Salesforce Case [Work Items (READ)]

• Update Salesforce Case [Work Items (READ)]
• Update Azure Issue [Work Items (READ, WRITE)]

The ZigiOps connector will automatically check the connection with the Azure DevOps instance and notify you when its successful. Together with that, the integration platform also fetches and loads the schema and data from the Azure DevOps system. This way you will have it available when you start setting your integration  filtering, mapping, correlation, etc.

Azure DevOps Salesforce integration configuration

When you go to the Configurator menu in ZigiOps, you will have two options  you can create an integration using one of our out-of-the-box templates or create a custom integration from scratch. You can choose one of the options according to your requirements and use case.

In our example, lets start from scratch. When we click on the Create custom integration button, ZigiOps will direct us step-by-step with the setup. First it will ask us to select the target system. In our example this would be Azure DevOps, and we just need to choose the instance that we connected a bit earlier.

Then we select the entity we want to transfer  as the schema is automatically populated, we just choose the one we need from the drop-down list.

Finally, we choose the action that we want to complete  create or update. Our initial action will be create as we create the Azure DevOps issue from the Salesforce case that matches our requirements.

Next, we need to select our source system  in this case Salesforce, and the entity we want to transfer from the pre-populated table.

Integration Action Items

For each integration, we can have unlimited number of actions that we can add. In our case we have three actions:

• The initial creation of the Azure DevOps issue when there is a new Salesforce case that needs to be transferred
• Updating the Salesforce case when there are changes in the corresponding Azure DevOps issue

• Updating the Azure DevOps issue when there are changes in the corresponding Salesforce case

Each action has easy to navigate options and settings we can adjust the way we need to.

For the first action  creating the Azure DevOps issue  we can set a trigger, trigger conditions and we can define different expressions to help us set all the conditions we need. In our example, the trigger is polling, and we have set it to check for updates every 1 minute.

You can see more detailed in formation about expressions in ZigiOps and how we use them in this article.

We can also map all fields the way we need to through the Field Map section.

Updating the Azure DevOps Issue

Whenever there are changes in the Salesforce case, we can set ZigiOps to collect them and update the corresponding Azure DevOps issue. For that purpose we create a new action and again, we can set the trigger, trigger conditions, and define expressions for these conditions. Also, we can easily map the fields we want to according to our use case through the Field Map section. All the data is already available in ZigiOps, so we just find the entities and fields we need from the drop-down menus.

Updating the Salesforce Case

The Azure DevOps Salesforce integration with ZigiOps is bi-directional, so we can have the platform sync all updates in the Azure DevOps issues to the corresponding Salesforce cases. Including if the issue is resolved, it can automatically close the Salesforce case and notify the responsible team members.

For this purpose we create the third action. Again we can set a trigger, trigger conditions and expressions. Also we can adjust the mapping of the fields we need to.

This finalizes our Azure DevOps Salesforce integration. We can click on the Save button in the upper right corner, and our integration will be activated.

Conclusion

Salesforce and Azure DevOps are among the most popular tools used in organizations today. This is not an accident. The two systems provide competitive advantages like improved productivity, automation and better customer experience.

A no-code bi-directional integration between Azure DevOps and Salesforce helps departments in the enterprise work better together, share processes and eliminate silos. By removing manual data transfer from the equation, they can achieve better efficiency, minimize mistakes and delays, significantly speed up issue resolutionsand improve the overall business results.

ZigiOps removes the need to choose between ease of use and flexibility. The integration platform provides smart automation in a straightforward way. With it you can seamlessly integrate Salesforce and Azure DevOps and have your integration ready in minutes. No coding knowledge is required, and you do not need to dedicate an expert to take care of the integration. Updating and upgrading is also easily done whenever needed. ZigiOps automatically supports the latest versions of the systems it integrates.

If you are using both Azure DevOps and Salesforce, get in touch with us and book a demo to see how ZigiOps can easily solve your integration challenges.