The time has come, and the moment has arrived when you’re nearing the end of this book, which can only mean one thing (well, it can mean many things, but one is most important): that the Salesforce Certified Administrator exam is right ahead of you. This exam is the culmination of your study journey and your hard work invested in analyzing Salesforce functionalities not only in theory but also, we hope, in practice. With this book, we wanted to encourage you not only to read about Salesforce but also to actively click through the system with us because there’s no better way to learn Salesforce than through hands-on practice. As they gracefully summarize it in Star Wars, “This is The Way”! Personally while preparing for the Administrator exam, I made sure to click through Salesforce everywhere and everything just to see how a particular functionality I just read about looks in practice. Let’s be honest, I didn’t always grasp every theory related to Salesforce features from the beginning. So, I had to dive into the system (on a developer’s test environment) and click around to see what would happen if I did this, and what would happen if I did something else. And there’s nothing wrong with that because, as we know, sometimes instructions (such as Salesforce Help) aren’t entirely clear or don’t describe everything accurately.
In this chapter, we would like to share our thoughts with you on how to prepare for the Salesforce Certified Administrator exam. We’ll first talk a bit about the exam format (or rather, formats, since they can vary) and provide information about scoring. Then, we’ll focus on the strategies you can employ during your Salesforce study to optimally use the time you have to prepare for the exam. I’ll describe one of the sources, which may not be obvious but was a game-changer for me in terms of learning and understanding the Salesforce platform. By the end of this chapter, we’ll provide you with some sample test questions we’ve prepared and describe a few tips and tricks related to the exam itself. Let’s get this party started!
We will cover the following topics in this chapter:
- Exam format and scoring
- Study strategies
- Tips and tricks for exam day
Exam format and scoring
The topic of certification was initially touched upon in Chapter 1, Getting Started with Salesforce, however, here we would like to delve deeper into it and focus solely on information related to the Salesforce Certified Administrator exam. After reading this book, approaching this exam should be one of your priorities. Of course, you can take the Associate exam before it, but despite its simplicity, its scope is different from the Administrator exam, and the book you are currently reading will better prepare you for the Administrator exam than the Associate exam. In this section, we will describe topics related to the format and scoring of the Salesforce Certified Administrator exam.
So, who is the Salesforce Certified Administrator exam for? According to the Salesforce exam guide, “the Salesforce Administrator credential is designed for individuals who have experience with Salesforce and continuously look for ways to assist their companies in getting even more from additional features and capabilities. The exam covers the breadth of applications, the features and functions available to an end user, and the configuration and management options available to an administrator across the Sales, Service.” As you can see, Salesforce takes a comprehensive approach to the Administrator exam. This is because a significant portion of the tasks that Salesforce Administrators undertake and the tools they can use to accomplish these tasks are common across the three clouds mentioned by Salesforce. This includes tasks such as adding and activating new users, managing permissions or access, creating record views, and automation. Okay, but getting to the heart of this chapter, let me tell you more about the exam itself.
At the time of writing this book, Salesforce provides the following information about the exam:
- Content: 60 multiple-choice/multiple-select questions and 5 non-scored questions
- Time allotted to complete the exam: 105 minutes
- Passing score: 65%
- Registration fee: USD 200 plus applicable taxes as required per local law
- Retake fee: USD 100 plus applicable taxes as required per local law
- Delivery options: Proctored exam delivered onsite at a testing center or in an online proctored environment
- References: No hard-copy or online materials may be referenced during the exam
- Prerequisites: None required; course attendance highly recommended
As you can see, there is quite a bit of time available in the exam, and you don’t need to score 100% (or even 70%) to pass.