Salesforce to Power BI for Manufacturing

Use Power BI Connector for Salesforce by Metrica Software to bring opportunity, account forecast, sales agreement, order, asset, and service data from Salesforce into Power BI.

Create reusable Salesforce data sources for manufacturing sales, demand, channel, and service reporting without developing and maintaining a custom Salesforce API integration.

Sales Cloud · Manufacturing Cloud Data · Custom Manufacturing Data · Power BI

Bring Manufacturing Sales, Demand, and Service Data From Salesforce Into Power BI

Manufacturers manage several different signals of customer demand in Salesforce.

New Opportunities represent potential business. Sales Agreements capture long-term customer commitments. Account Forecasts show expected quantities and revenue. Orders provide actual purchasing activity when they are maintained or synchronized in Salesforce. Assets and Cases provide information about installed products and customer service.

Manufacturing companies may also use custom Salesforce objects for distributors, product hierarchies, warranties, customer programs, installed equipment, territories, or internal forecasting processes.

Reporting on these records separately makes it difficult to answer important questions:

• How much demand should we expect by product, customer, and region?
• Are actual orders tracking planned customer commitments?
• Which agreements or accounts are falling behind forecast?
• How much new pipeline could convert into future demand?
• Which distributors and territories are contributing to growth?
• Where are service problems creating commercial risk?
• How does Salesforce demand compare with orders, shipments, inventory, and revenue from ERP systems?

Answering these questions in Power BI requires complete Salesforce data with the correct objects, fields, filters, and relationships.

Solve Salesforce Power BI Integration Challenges in Manufacturing

The Integration Challenge

Manufacturing sales and customer data is rarely stored in a single Salesforce object or report.

Accounts identify customers and distributors. Opportunities represent potential business. Opportunity Products show which products and quantities are being discussed. Sales Agreements define planned customer commitments. Account Forecasts contain expected quantities or revenue by period. Orders represent actual purchasing activity. Assets and Cases provide information about installed products and service performance.

Custom manufacturing processes can add further objects and fields for product hierarchies, territories, customer programs, warranties, distributors, forecasts, or installed equipment.

These Salesforce records must be connected correctly before they can support reliable reporting in Power BI.

Manual exports create temporary snapshots and must be repeated whenever the data changes. Exporting separate objects or reports can also lose the relationships between customers, agreements, products, forecasts, Orders, Assets, and Cases.

A custom Salesforce API integration requires development, authentication management, monitoring, and ongoing updates as Salesforce objects and reporting requirements change.

Manufacturing reporting adds another integration challenge. Pipeline, forecast, agreement, customer, and service data may be maintained in Salesforce, while orders, shipments, inventory, production, cost, and recognized revenue remain in an ERP system.

Power BI needs a reliable Salesforce data source before it can combine the commercial and operational sides of the business.

How Power BI Connector for Salesforce Solves It

Power BI Connector for Salesforce provides a managed connection between Salesforce and Power BI.

Teams configure the required Salesforce data inside the connector and make it available as reusable Power BI data sources.

With the connector, teams can:

• Select the standard and custom Salesforce objects required for manufacturing reporting
• Choose the exact fields needed in Power BI
• Include relationships between Salesforce entities
• Apply filters before transferring data to Power BI
• Create data sources from existing Salesforce reports
• Preview the selected data before connecting it to Power BI
• Review relationships between Accounts, Opportunities, Products, Agreements, Forecasts, Orders, Assets, and Cases
• Reuse the same Salesforce data source across multiple Power BI reports
• Update the data source as the Salesforce implementation changes
• Use incremental refresh for growing Salesforce datasets
• Review Data Source History, Export History, and Access Token History
• Embed secure Power BI reports inside Salesforce

The connector supplies the Salesforce side of the Power BI model. ERP, finance, inventory, logistics, or production data can be connected to Power BI separately through the company’s existing data architecture.

Power BI can then combine both sides of the model for forecast, demand, order, shipment, margin, and service analysis.

This gives manufacturers a repeatable Salesforce-to-Power BI integration without maintaining a separate custom API pipeline for every reporting requirement.

Salesforce-to-Power BI Reporting Use Cases for Manufacturing Companies

Build One Manufacturing Forecast Across New and Existing Business

New Opportunities and existing customer business often represent different parts of a manufacturing forecast.

Open Opportunities show potential new business. Sales Agreements and Account Forecasts describe expected business from existing customers. Orders show actual purchasing activity when the data is available in Salesforce.

Bring Salesforce Opportunities, Opportunity Products, Products, Sales Agreements, Sales Agreement Products, product schedules, Account Forecasts, and Orders into Power BI.

Analyze:

• Forecasted quantity and revenue
• Open pipeline
• Weighted pipeline
• Existing customer demand
• Demand by product family
• Demand by customer
• Forecast by region and territory
• Forecast by direct and partner channels
• Forecast changes over time
• Forecast variance against actual Orders
• New business contribution to future demand
• Forecast coverage by period

Sales and planning teams receive a consistent view of potential, expected, committed, and actual customer demand.

Power BI Connector for Salesforce allows the data source to follow the forecasting structure already used in Salesforce, including relevant standard, Manufacturing Cloud, and custom objects.

Track Salesforce Sales Agreement Performance in Power BI

Sales Agreements define planned product quantities, prices, and revenue over an agreed period.

Account managers need to know whether actual customer purchasing activity is tracking these commitments and which agreements are likely to underperform.

Bring Sales Agreements, Sales Agreement Products, product schedules, Account Forecasts, Accounts, Products, and Salesforce Order data into Power BI.

Track:

• Planned versus actual quantity
• Planned versus actual order value
• Agreement attainment
• Remaining customer commitment
• Monthly and quarterly variance
• Agreements at risk of underperformance
• Performance by account
• Performance by product
• Agreement performance by region
• Agreement performance by sales owner
• Changes to planned quantities and revenue

Account managers can identify where customer purchasing activity is moving away from the agreed plan and decide which accounts require follow-up.

If actual order data is stored only in an ERP system, Power BI can combine the Salesforce agreement data delivered by the connector with ERP orders connected separately.

Analyze Manufacturing Product, Territory, and Channel Performance

Manufacturers may sell directly, through distributors, or through a combination of channels.

Product, territory, distributor, and Opportunity data may be represented through standard Salesforce relationships or company-specific custom objects.

Bring Salesforce Accounts, Partners, Opportunities, Opportunity Products, Products, Territories, Orders, and custom distributor data into Power BI.

Compare:

• Direct and partner-generated pipeline
• Sales performance by distributor
• Pipeline coverage by region
• Win rate by product family
• Average deal value
• Sales cycle length
• Customer concentration
• Product demand by territory
• Revenue by channel
• Distributor performance by product
• Active and inactive channel partners
• Regions with limited pipeline coverage

Sales and channel leaders can identify which markets, distributors, and product lines are contributing to growth.

Power BI Connector for Salesforce can include the custom objects and fields used to represent distributor networks, internal territories, product hierarchies, or partner programs.

Connect Salesforce Assets With Service Performance in Power BI

Salesforce Assets and Cases provide information about products already operating at customer locations.

Connecting installed product data with service activity helps manufacturers understand the customer relationship after the initial sale.

Bring Salesforce Assets, Products, Accounts, Cases, Contracts, warranty fields, and service-related custom objects into Power BI.

Analyze:

• Installed Assets by product
• Installed Assets by customer and region
• Open and resolved Cases
• Case volume relative to the installed base
• Repeat issues by product
• Issues by product model or version
• Average response time
• Average resolution time
• Warranty expirations
• Customers with growing service risk
• Products associated with high service demand
• Renewal or expansion Opportunities associated with service issues

Commercial and service teams receive a shared view of installed products, customer issues, and potential account risk.

The connector preserves the Salesforce relationships between Accounts, Assets, Products, Contracts, Cases, and Opportunities so they can be analyzed together in Power BI.

Compare Salesforce Forecasts With ERP Orders and Operational Actuals

Salesforce provides the commercial view of expected customer demand.

ERP systems typically provide operational and financial data such as orders, shipments, inventory, backlog, cost, invoices, and recognized revenue.

Power BI Connector for Salesforce can supply:

• Sales pipeline
• Opportunity Products
• Customer and account data
• Sales Agreements
• Account Forecasts
• Salesforce Orders
• Products
• Partners
• Assets
• Service Cases

Existing Power BI connections can supply:

• ERP order book
• Shipments
• Inventory
• Production data
• Backlog
• Product cost
• Invoices
• Recognized revenue
• Margin data

Power BI can combine these data sources to analyze:

• Forecast versus order book
• Pipeline versus available inventory
• Planned versus ordered quantity
• Ordered versus shipped quantity
• Forecast-to-order conversion
• Revenue and margin by customer
• Backlog by product and region
• Commercial forecast versus recognized revenue
• Agreement commitments versus actual shipments
• Product demand versus operational capacity

Leadership receives one Power BI view across customer demand, commercial commitments, and operational performance.

For manufacturers using SAP, ERP data can be supplied through the existing Power BI architecture or Power BI Connector for SAP by Metrica Software. Power BI Connector for Salesforce remains responsible for the Salesforce side of the model.

Salesforce Data Available for Manufacturing Reporting in Power BI

The Power BI data model can follow the structure of the company’s existing Salesforce implementation.

Standard Salesforce Objects

Connect Accounts, Contacts, Opportunities, Opportunity Products, Products, Price Books, Quotes, Orders, Contracts, Assets, Cases, Territories, Partners, Tasks, and Events.

Salesforce Manufacturing Cloud Data

Manufacturing Cloud adds industry-specific structures for managing customer commitments and forecasts.

Depending on the company’s Salesforce configuration, the Power BI data source may include:

• Sales Agreements
• Sales Agreement Products
• Product schedules
• Account Forecasts
• Account and product forecasts by period
• Related standard and custom Salesforce fields

Power BI Connector for Salesforce can access Manufacturing Cloud objects when they are available through Salesforce APIs and accessible to the authorized Salesforce user.

The exact Manufacturing Cloud objects and relationships required for a Power BI model can be validated during the connector evaluation.

Custom Salesforce Objects and Fields

Include custom data used for:

• Distributors
• Product hierarchies
• Customer programs
• Internal forecasts
• Territories
• Warranties
• Installed equipment
• Dealer networks
• Contract pricing
• Product configurations
• Customer classifications
• Manufacturing-specific sales processes

Custom and installed application objects can be used when they are available through Salesforce APIs and accessible to the authorized Salesforce user.

Existing Salesforce Reports

Create Power BI data sources from Salesforce reports already used by sales, operations, channel, and service teams.

Power BI Connector for Salesforce supports tabular, summary, matrix, and joined reports.

Teams can reuse existing Salesforce report logic and make the report data available for further Power BI modeling and analysis. The connector can also process report results beyond the 2,000-detail-row limit returned by the Salesforce Reports API.

Data From ERP and Other Business Systems

Combine the Salesforce data with:

• Customer orders
• Shipments
• Inventory
• Production plans
• Production capacity
• Backlog
• Product cost
• Invoices
• Recognized revenue
• Margin data
• Logistics information
• Warranty systems
• IoT and connected product data

Power BI Connector for Salesforce delivers the Salesforce data. ERP and other operational systems remain connected to Power BI through the company’s existing connections and data architecture.

How Manufacturing Teams Use Salesforce Data in Power BI

Sales Leadership

Use Salesforce Opportunity, product, forecast, territory, and account data in Power BI to monitor pipeline, forecast coverage, win rates, product demand, and regional performance.

Key Account Managers

Use Salesforce Account, Sales Agreement, Forecast, Order, Asset, Activity, and Case data in Power BI to track customer commitments, agreement attainment, upcoming Opportunities, and account-level risks.

Operations and Planning

Use Salesforce Account Forecast, Sales Agreement, Opportunity Product, and Order data in Power BI to review expected quantities by product and period.

Combine it with ERP orders, inventory, production, and shipment data to compare commercial demand with operational actuals.

Channel Management

Use Salesforce partner, distributor, Opportunity, Product, and territory data in Power BI to measure distributor pipeline, partner revenue, product performance, and market coverage.

Service Leadership

Use Salesforce Asset, Product, Contract, warranty, and Case data in Power BI to analyze the installed base, Case volumes, resolution performance, and recurring product issues.

Executives

Combine Salesforce pipeline, forecast, agreement, customer, channel, Asset, and service data with ERP and financial data in a consolidated Power BI model.

How Power BI Connector for Salesforce Delivers Manufacturing Data to Power BI

1. Select Salesforce Objects or Reports

Choose the Salesforce objects, fields, relationships, and records required for the Power BI report.

Teams can select standard Salesforce objects, Manufacturing Cloud data, custom manufacturing objects, or an existing Salesforce report.

2. Configure the Power BI Data Source in Salesforce

Create and manage the data source inside Power BI Connector for Salesforce.

Preview the selected data, review entity relationships, and apply filters before connecting the source to Power BI.

The configured data source can be updated and reused without developing a separate Salesforce API integration.

3. Connect the Salesforce Data Source to Power BI

Use the generated Power Query connection to load the configured Salesforce data into Power BI.

Build Power BI relationships, semantic models, calculations, visualizations, reports, and dashboards based on the company’s manufacturing reporting requirements.

4. Combine Salesforce Data With ERP Data in Power BI

Connect order, shipment, inventory, production, cost, and financial data to Power BI through existing ERP or data warehouse connections.

Combine this operational data with the Salesforce data delivered through Power BI Connector for Salesforce.

5. Refresh Salesforce Data in Power BI

Configure scheduled refresh in Power BI.

Incremental refresh can be used for growing Opportunity, Order, Activity, Asset, Case, and custom object datasets so that Power BI processes new and updated records without repeatedly loading the complete history.

6. Embed Power BI Reports Back Into Salesforce

Add secure Power BI reports to dashboards managed through Power BI Connector for Salesforce.

Share the dashboards with selected Salesforce users and groups. Power BI continues to control access to the embedded report content.

Frequently Asked Questions

Do We Need Salesforce Manufacturing Cloud?

No. Manufacturing reporting in Power BI can be built from Sales Cloud, Service Cloud, standard Salesforce objects, custom objects, and existing Salesforce reports.

Manufacturing Cloud adds industry-specific data structures such as Sales Agreements and Account Forecasts.

Can Power BI Connector for Salesforce Export Manufacturing Cloud Objects?

The connector can access standard and custom Salesforce objects that are available through Salesforce APIs and accessible to the authorized Salesforce user.

This can include the objects used for Manufacturing Cloud Sales Agreements and Account Forecasting.

The exact objects and relationships required for the Power BI model can be validated during the connector evaluation.

Does Power BI Connector for Salesforce Import ERP Data?

No. Power BI Connector for Salesforce delivers Salesforce data to Power BI.

ERP orders, shipments, inventory, production, cost, and financial data are connected to Power BI separately. Power BI then combines the Salesforce and ERP data in one model.

Can We Combine Salesforce and SAP Data in Power BI?

Yes. Power BI can combine Salesforce data delivered through Power BI Connector for Salesforce with SAP data from the company’s existing architecture.

SAP data can also be supplied through Power BI Connector for SAP by Metrica Software where the relevant SAP environment is supported.

Does the Connector Calculate Demand Forecasts or Agreement Attainment?

The connector delivers the required Salesforce data to Power BI.

Forecast calculations, agreement attainment, forecast variance, conversion rates, and other company-specific metrics are defined in Power BI.

Can the Connector Use Existing Salesforce Reports?

Yes. Power BI data sources can be created from tabular, summary, matrix, and joined Salesforce reports.

This allows teams to reuse established Salesforce report logic and analyze the resulting data in Power BI.

Can the Connector Export Custom Manufacturing Objects?

Yes, if the custom objects and fields are available through Salesforce APIs and accessible to the authorized Salesforce user.

This can include custom data for distributors, warranties, product hierarchies, customer programs, installed equipment, territories, dealer networks, and internal forecasts.

Do We Need to Build a Salesforce API Integration?

No custom Salesforce API pipeline is required.

The required Salesforce objects, fields, relationships, reports, and filters are configured in Power BI Connector for Salesforce and made available as reusable Power BI data sources.

Can Power BI Reports Be Embedded in Salesforce?

Yes. Power BI reports can be added to dashboards managed through Power BI Connector for Salesforce and shared with selected Salesforce users or groups.

Power BI continues to control access to the embedded report content.

Evaluate Power BI Connector for Salesforce With Your Manufacturing Data

Bring an existing Salesforce report, forecast process, list of required Salesforce objects, or Power BI reporting requirement for demand, agreements, Orders, products, channels, Assets, or service performance.

We will show how Power BI Connector for Salesforce can deliver the relevant Salesforce data to Power BI, preserve the required relationships, apply filters, and create a reusable data source for your manufacturing reports.