Salesforce Spring ‘24 Release Schedule
Before we dive into the top features, let’s review the schedule itself. For the Salesforce platform, including B2B Commerce, D2C Commerce, and Order Management, the release date for Spring ’24 will be one of the following, depending on your instance of Salesforce:
- January 12, 2024
- February 2, 2024
- February 9, 2024
To confirm your release date, ask your admin for your production org’s Salesforce instance. Then visit Salesforce Status, click on your instance name, and hit “Maintenance.”
Salesforce B2C Commerce has a distinct release schedule from the Salesforce CRM Platform, and releases platform updates monthly:
- 24.1 will release starting January 9th
- 24.2 will release starting February 13th
- 24.3 will release starting March 12th
To confirm your release date, ask your Commerce admin for your POD number, and determine if you’re in Phase 1 or Phase 2 in the B2C Deployment Schedule.
Top Spring ‘24 Features for Salesforce B2C Commerce
Granular Replications
The ability for merchants to publish only the products and pricing they need to will be a welcome change for everyone who’s ever pushed content to an SFCC production instance. We’ve already written at-length about this feature, and we’re excited to see it come out of pilot and into an Open Beta in Q1.
Generative Page Designer
Page Designer already changed the game for SFCC content curators, and now your friendly neighborhood LLM will be lending a hand. Merchants can use natural language to create components (confirmed) and pages (we expect), improving efficiency and scalability using SFCC’s native content editor.
Commerce Intelligence
Salesforce Commerce Cloud already pairs nicely with Data Cloud, leveling up personalization in a number of ways. Now Salesforce will be introducing a new product on top of this pairing: Commerce Intelligence. Powered with Data Cloud, Commerce Intelligence will be able to inform merchants about both product and customers in ways not possible today, from advanced insights into top-performing products to real-time metrics around customer loyalty and risk.
This is entering Pilot in Q1, so reach out to your Salesforce Commerce Account Executive if you’re interested in participating early.
Note: Commerce Intelligence will also be available on Salesforce B2B and D2C Commerce.
Custom APIs
This long-requested feature for developers is currently in beta and expected to hit GA in the Spring. Salesforce is rolling out more and more functionality into this feature based on beta feedback, which is promising. Soon SFCC developers and architects can expect a secure, scalable mechanism for innovation with external clients interfacing with SF B2C.
Performance Improvements Across the Board
Last but certainly not least - in fact, we might be most excited about this compared to everything else - Salesforce has promised a slew of performance improvements for B2C Commerce in Spring ‘24. Some highlights:
- Page Designer updates will hopefully not only make the editor more performant but also optimize the content editing UX.
- Salesforce Commerce APIs (SCAPI) are seeing a number of innovations including web tier caching, removal of rate limits, and filters to reduce over-fetching. In other words: faster and better APIs.
- A new Composable Storefront Performance Dashboard will provide insights for those customers who have gone headless using the PWA Kit.
Top Spring ‘24 Features for Salesforce B2B and D2C Commerce
Faster Store Setup
Salesforce has invested heavily in helping its CRM customers quickly enable B2B Commerce, and that innovation continues with Spring ‘24. With the latest updates some customers can have a store setup in as little as 30 minutes.
- Guided AI-driven tasks provide an automated workflow for getting started
- Smart Branding powered by Einstein AI is a noteworthy feature: enter your existing site’s URL, and Einstein will brand your B2B/D2C store accordingly. A great starting point for you to fine-tune your look and feel!
- Faster Product Import promises a 75% improvement in bulk importing products and a 3X improvement for products with rich media.
Commerce Concierge
The recent viral sensation that is Chevrolet of Watsonville has reinforced what a lot of organizations have been hearing all year: it’s important to ground your prompts and fence your AI before sending it out to your customers. Salesforce has an answer here with Commerce Concierge, powered with Service Cloud, that will provide a generative AI chatbot for multiple customer touchpoints: WhatsApp, iMessage, and more. Shielded with the Einstein Trust Layer that keeps your organizational data within your organization, this new interface will allow customers not only to get customer service, but also to enjoy a guided selling experience, optionally authenticate, and complete checkout.
Note: Commerce Concierge will also be available for Salesforce B2C Commerce.
Cart Calculate API
The new extensibility framework for Cart and Checkout has been a long-awaited refactoring that should really empower development teams. It also promises a level-up in performance. This is already Generally Available and will be on by default for new stores in Spring ‘24.
Top Spring ‘24 Features for Salesforce Order Management
Return Insights
Salesforce’s biggest AI-powered innovation in Order Management is Return Insights, which boasts a natural language element. Customers can either choose their pre-selected return reason or enter free text, and Einstein’s natural language processing will help merchants understand how to improve their commerce and service experience at scale. Paired with advanced reporting, this is a feature we’ve heard firsthand that customers are hungry for.
Exchanges with Repricing API
With this new advanced and flexible API, customers can select new products during exchanges and automatically handle various repricing scenarios. This includes automated refunds and RMAs as applicable.
Note: Both Salesforce B2C and B2B/D2C customers can benefit when integrated with Order Management
While we covered a lot in this Spring ‘24 preview, with only 10 items featured we truly only scratched the surface. Salesforce is investing heavily into Commerce in Spring ‘24, and we expect that investment to continue into 2024 and 2025.
Need help getting your Sites and Stores AI-ready for Spring ‘24? Get in touch.