Certification


Guide to Certification

Salesforce.com Certification is a professional credential for Force.com developers and Salesforce administrators that validates your knowledge and skills. The Certification program is organized into three tracks, targeted towards Force.com Developers, Salesforce Administrators, and Salesforce Consultants. This article describes the certification program, key benefits, paths to certification, certification exam structure, and the preparatory classes.

Why Get Certified?

Earning a Salesforce.com Certified credential allows you to demonstrate your hard-earned skills. Certification can enhance your professional development, open new doors, and lead to job opportunities. It allows you to validate your expertise, and join the ranks of other highly qualified professionals who have a similar level of expertise with Salesforce and Force.com.

When you earn your credential by passing the requisite certification exam, you get:

  • A Salesforce.com Certified certificate
  • A Salesforce.com Certified logo to use on business cards, resumes, email signatures and social networking profiles
  • Free access to Release Training materials
  • Membership in the exclusive Salesforce Certified Professionals community
  • Personal growth and professional advancement

Certification and Certification Paths

When you successfully pass a certification exam, you are considered certified and you become a part of our certified professionals community. To maintain your certification, you have to take and pass an online exam for each product release within your certification year. The interim online release exams test your knowledge of the new release features, to ensure that your knowledge and expertise stay current with our products and features. You will be automatically notified when these tests become available, and you will receive access to the supporting release training material to help you prepare for the exams. The cost of the release exams is included in the initial certification fee for your first certification year. After the first year, you will be charged a certification renewal fee yearly, or every third release exam.

Here are the levels of certification:

  • For Developers: Salesforce.com Certified Force.com Developer and Salesforce.com Certified Advanced Developer.
  • For Administrators: Salesforce.com Certified Administrator and Salesforce.com Certified Advanced Administrator.
  • For Consultants: Salesforce.com Certified Administrator and Salesforce.com Certified Consultant.

Certification Preparatory Classes

To get ready for the certification exams, you can sign up for one of the preparatory classes. The certification exam is included in the price of these classes. Of course, if you believe you're already at the right level, simply sign up for the certification and study on your own before you attempt the exam.

For Developers, we recommend the following preparatory classes:

  • DEV 401 Building Applications with Force.com and Visualforce
  • DEV 501 Apex and Visualforce Controllers

For Administrators, we recommend:

  • ADM 201 Administration Essentials
  • ADM 301 Advanced Administration

DEV 401: Building Applications with Force.com and Visualforce

This hands-on course covers the object model and how to configure applications with metadata—the fundamentals of creating Force.com applications. You’ll learn how to build a sophisticated application from start to finish, including how to design applications for the cloud, create custom objects, use workflow and rules to automate processes, and build the user interface.

DEV 501: Apex and Visualforce Controllers

Designed for experienced developers, this hands-on course provides a deep dive into the Force.com programming languages (Apex) and the cloud-based development environment. You’ll explore how to develop custom interfaces and write business logic and interactions. You’ll find out how to manage your projects in the cloud, using team development and debugging best practices. And you’ll learn to use platform’s deployment capabilities.

ADM 201: Administration Essentials for Enterprise or Unlimited Edition

This course is for new administrators or those who want to brush up on their core skills. You’ll learn how to set up, configure, maintain, and customize Salesforce CRM. The course also covers key features, including enterprise security, data utilities, and analytics.

ADM 301: Advanced Administration

Ready to tackle your biggest administration challenges? Using real-world scenarios, Advanced Administration covers advanced topics such as managing data, enhancing end-user productivity, and expanding Salesforce CRM.

Additional Classes

Other classes are also available. Although they do not fall within a certification path, these classes will broaden your knowledge of the platform:

  • DEV 502: Force.com Integrations
  • DEV 531: Introduction to Object-Oriented Programming with Force.com Code (Apex)

DEV 502: Force.com Integrations

This course teaches you how to design and build all types of integrations with the Force.com platform. The first day introduces the major integration methods and demonstrates techniques for using those methods. In the remaining days, you’ll explore the specifics of the major technologies that play a role in integration, including the Force.com Web services API, sites, and portals.

DEV 531: Introduction to Object-Oriented Programming with Force.com Code (Apex)

If you’re new to programming, this course introduces you to object-oriented programming with Apex (Force.com code). You’ll learn the basics of creating classes and triggers, as well as the best practices and methodology concepts you’ll need to build Force.com applications. When you complete this class, you’ll know how to approach your first programming assignment, write basic code to build applications, and work with the Force.com tool set.

Certification Exam Structure

Developer certification exams feature multiple-choice and multiple-select questions that cover a broad range of topics, as outlined in the exam study guides. There are two components to the Salesforce.com Certified Force.com Advanced Developer credential. First, you must take and pass a multiple-choice and multiple-select exam. Next, will have to build and submit a programming assignment, which requires you to develop Apex and Visualforce code to meet a prescribed set of requirements and explain your coding choices.

The exams tests for understanding of the most important Salesforce features rather than information that must be memorized. For this reason, the exams include few, if any, questions about limits, numbers, or items that can be easily looked up when needed. To get an idea of the level of difficulty, see the exam study guides.

Free Podcasts

You can access free Force.com Classroom Training to help you prepare for the classes and exams. The Training and Certification iTunes Podcast Page features over 60 episodes, covering much of DEV 401 and DEV 501.

Summary

Salesforce.com Certification is a professional certification, allowing you to validate and declare your expertise. Certification is available for Developers, Administrators, and Consultants.

Links

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