As you hopefully know by now, we here at Salesforce Weekly are big fans of Lightning. When we’re not busy working in Lightning during our day jobs, we like to share the love and the knowledge by delivering presentations like DF17’s Make the Jump to Lightning …And Get It Right First Time. But hopefully one other thing you know about us by now is that we’re realists, and we prefer to keep our feet on the ground rather than our head in the clouds. So while we are Lightning lovers, we also totally appreciate that not everyone has made the jump to the new experience just yet, and that there are plenty of orgs out there which are still running in Salesforce Classic.
If you own or work in one of those orgs, then something you might have seen more and more of over the last few weeks are welcome mats.
Huh? Welcome mats? What like this…?
Well, kinda. Let’s back up.
When I say ‘welcome mats’ what I’m referring to is a group of in-org features and displays which really serve the purpose of ‘encouraging’ you and your users to use the Lightning Experience. Some of these features are things like prompts appearing in Salesforce Classic, while a recent addition is a process whereby users are actually automatically switched to Lightning and shown an on-screen ‘welcome mat’ letting them know what they can expect to see and do in the new experience.
Perhaps this isn’t news to you. Perhaps you’ve already seen plenty of online discussion, chattering, and – let’s be honest – moaning about these ‘enhancements’. Because much like real welcome mats, these additions are getting trounced, trodden on, and trashed.
So the main aim of today’s post is to try to dispel some of that feverish foot-wiping, firstly by educating you about exactly what these features are and when they will appear (and, critically, when they won’t), and secondly by letting you know how you can disable them if you choose to do so. If you find that your welcome mats are outstaying their welcome, here’s how to politely show them the door.
So what are we dealing with here, exactly?
Although they have a few guises, everything we mean when we say ‘welcome mat’ really fits the following definition: they are prompts to encourage you and your users to try Lightning Experience.
The two ways these prompts are delivered are:
1) By presenting a “Try Lightning Experience Now” or an “It’s Better In Lightning” prompt, like those shown below
This prompt is a general ‘come and try Lightning’
This prompt is a more contextual and shows the user how what they’re currently doing is ‘better in Lightning’
Those kind of prompts might surprise your users, but at least they’re easily dismissed. This next kind of ‘prompt’ is, well, a little more intrusive…
2) Auto-switching the user to Lightning, and showing them a welcome mat
Yep, you read that correctly: automatically taking the user out of the familiar, comfortable, warm embrace of Classic and dumping them naked in the wonderful whitespace wilderness of Lightning. Huh.
But… but, but, but… Don’t worry too much just yet because the truth is that these features only affect two groups of Salesforce users. Those are: firstly, admins. And, secondly: erm, well, non-admins. So, er, yeah, that’s absolutely everyone. Oh.
In which case, what do we need to know about these features, and what on earth can we do about them? Never fear, Salesforce Weekly is here to guide you. Let’s look at these features in turn by their intended audience, starting with non-admins, your day-to-day user of Salesforce.
What’s the score with user prompts?
Tell me I’m wrong if you feel that I am, but I refuse to believe that many orgs these days are sticking to Classic because they don’t know of the alternative. Everyone who keeps even vaguely up to date with Salesforce technology news and announcements must surely know about the Lightning Experience by now. It’s not exactly new anymore. So that can’t be why these prompts and welcome mats exist, can it?
Therefore, if your users aren’t in Lightning, it’s more likely to be a choice that you have made on their behalf and for their benefit. And it’s only right that you should want to protect these users from any confusion that these prompts, welcome mats and ‘oh, woah, where the flip has Classic gone?!’ moments might cause. Let’s look at how you can do that.
Firstly, don’t worry too much (and I promise I mean it this time). Users will only see these prompts and this switching behaviour if both of the following things are true:
- Lightning Experience is enabled in your production org
- The user’s profile (or a permission set) grants them access to Lightning Experience
That first caveat should be enough to put most people’s minds at rest. If your org has no big desires and designs to move to Lightning any time soon, then it really, really, really should not be enabled in production. If you want to try out the new experience for yourself, please for the love of all things holy, do that in a sandbox.
Even if, for whatever reason, you’ve decided to enable Lightning in production, these changes will still only affect users whose profile/permissions give them access to Lightning. Just remember that all standard profiles come with this access enabled, so if you use those standard profiles then this is something to watch out for (and maybe yet another reason why you shouldn’t use them).
Secondly, even if both of those things are true, relax – the admin can still control this behaviour, in the following ways:
- Disabling the prompts, on the Onboarding & Assistance page in Setup
- Preventing auto-switching overall, on the Lightning Experience page in Setup, or;
- Preventing more granularly by giving users the Remain in Salesforce Classic permission
So, no fear, you have options. And now you know what those options are. Win! And if you want to learn more, check out these two help articles: bit.ly/LEXprompts and bit.ly/LEXswitch.
How about those admin prompts?
The above user-facing features are part of the Summer ’18 release, and so they’ve been around for (depending on your org instance) a couple of weeks or so. But, in late breaking news, as of earlier this very week (June 26th, to be exact), admins get their own ‘try Lightning’ prompt too. Lucky you! And, even better news, it’s in the form of a banner. We all love banners, right?! Rejoice!
Alright, before I get too bogged down by the sheer weight of cynicism on my shoulders, let’s deal in some specifics and answer some questions.
Let’s start with ‘where?‘… This admin banner will be displayed on all pages for accounts, contacts, dashboards, and in Setup.
Now, the ‘who?’ is a little more interesting. For this purpose, Salesforce have chosen to define an ‘admin’ as anyone who has any of the following three permissions:
- Customize Application
- Modify All Data
- Manage Users
So bear in mind that as well as true admins (you might have your own definition, but for me it’s users with both of the first two permissions listed there) this will impact anyone like a regional super-user who you task with delegated admin rights including managing users, or maybe some bigwig in a suit who once demanded you give him (and, let’s be honest, based on this description it probably will be a him) the ability to modify all data simply because he’s the boss.
But, once more, sit back and watch as Salesforce Weekly saves the day and tells you how you can disable this banner. And thankfully it’s just a single step:
- Deselect Enable Salesforce Notification Banner on the User Interface page in Setup
Easy, hey?
Anything else we should know?
That’s about it for today, but before we leave you, please listen to these important messages from our valued sponsors… Just kidding, of course. Salesforce Weekly proudly (and skint-ly) remains a sponsor-free zone. So these are more self-serving shameless plugs than adverts…
Firstly, I delivered a live version of this content today on the EMEA MVP Office Hours call. If you don’t know what that is, it’s a monthly online meeting where anyone (inside or outside of EMEA time zones) can dial in and ask a few of us European MVPs any Salesforce question they like. These calls don’t mean much without people on the other end of the line giving us questions, sharing their thoughts, or just plain old listening. So join us! You can start by following EMEA MVP Office Hours on Twitter, and by joining our group on the Trailblazer Community.
Secondly, and pretty much related to this post’s theme of Lightning adoption (albeit from the other angle), on today’s EMEA call we were lucky enough to be joined by Carlos Siqueira who kindly shared some useful information about the Lightning Champions program. Whether you’ve gone through the move to Lightning and have war stories to tell, or if you’re considering making the move yourself and are looking for guidance and knowledge, do check it out.
This is a blueprint for anyone facing migration to Lightning.