Einstein Prediction Builder: The best decision for your organization yet?

“Imagine you’re sailing without a point of destination,” says Aldo Jiménez, Einstein and Analytics Principal Solution Engineer at Salesforce. “You’re just kind of drifting. Yes, you’re operational but you need to have a target or goal.”

Letting the currents take you wherever is not an option for any organization. Only intentional organizations will be successful, and that’s where Salesforce's Einstein Prediction Builder comes in.

How Einstein Prediction Builder helps organizations

Einstein Prediction Builder leverages artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning to analyze data, find correlations, and predict future outcomes. In practical terms, the tool allows Salesforce CRM users to discover insights about their members and make organizational decisions based on real-time analytics and key business drivers.

The predictions created by Einstein will help you anticipate future scenarios and allow you to focus your team’s efforts where they will have the greatest impact on your organization.

Getting started with Einstein Prediction Builder

According to Aldo, Einstein Prediction Builder was created to be used by anyone. In fact, he says, “The best person to create a prediction is not a data scientist but someone who knows the data and day-to-day operations of the business.”

While the platform offers “out of the box” functionality, because it uses clicks rather than code to operate, you can actually build your own formulas to suit the unique needs of your organization. To do so, it’s about understanding the variables in your data and seeing patterns emerge.

You can trust Einstein

Einstein Prediction Builder was created with trust and transparency in mind, says Aldo. “We don’t want to have a black box of predictive models,” he explains. “You don’t want to end up with a prediction without knowing how it came about.”

“Let’s take recommendations from Netflix or Amazon as an example,” he continues. “Sometimes they’re good and sometimes they’re erratic. We don’t know what’s behind the prediction and whether it’s a good or bad model.” In using Einstein Prediction Builder you can be assured that you’ll know what algorithm was used, the main variables and predictors considered, and whether there is any data missing.

AI optimization for your community center: Better than a crystal ball

There is no shortage of ways Einstein Prediction Builder can work for your community center. One way is by creating a prediction for membership churn, which is the likelihood a member may not renew their annual membership. With Prediction Builder, you'll not only discover the accounts that have a high likelihood to cancel, but you’ll also know the top predictors of why they’re likely to cancel.

The best person to create a prediction is not a data scientist but someone who knows the data and day-to-day operations of the business.

With predictability, comes opportunity. Put a member on an email marketing journey to learn more about program offerings, send a promo discount code as incentive to register for a class, or schedule a phone call to personally invite them to a special event. These are all actions you can take, as a result from your own data, that can produce significant impact on the behaviors of members.

Beyond membership churn, there is so much more you could predict about your organization: lead conversion, likelihood of a particular member to purchase a specific type of program, identifying what type of program engagement is most likely to lead to donations, among others factors.

Each prediction produces a scorecard, a snapshot that identifies your criteria quality (like having enough data points), identifies top predictors and which values have the highest impact (like facility visits or number of program registrations in the last 3 months), and rates the level of how accurate your prediction is.

Data that's easy to interpret: Reports and dashboards

It’s hard not to talk about data and Salesforce without mentioning key elements of reports and dashboards. Viewing prediction results in reports, real-time dashboards, and even in individual member records, means you can examine risks and challenges at the most granular level.

With the help of the Einstein Prediction Builder and its guided assistance, most users can create a prediction in under an hour. The process includes identifying the business challenge and what to predict, defining the criteria, establishing the datasets to include for analysis, and activating the prediction to evaluate the results. For a complete step-by-step guide on the prediction lifecycle read How To Turn Your Idea Into a Prediction.

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Einstein Prediction Builder challenge: Try out Einstein Prediction Builder yourself, and predict which restaurant reservations will be no-shows. Go to the Salesforce Trailhead to try it out hands-on.

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Don’t drift… shift!

Using Einstein Prediction Builder will change the way you look at your data. Before, you might have been looking at your data from a historical perspective, but now you’ll be making predictions about what’s going to happen in the future. The benefit of making predictions is that the power is in your hands to take action, and to help change the outcome of your biggest challenges and risks.

Aldo says it’s typical for organizations to make decisions based on assumptions. “But as we see with the pandemic,” he muses, “you need to have the flexibility to adjust the path of navigation.” Otherwise, your organization will just continue to drift rather than shift into the next gear.

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We can help

Get in touch with us to learn how we can help you get a head start on predictive formulas to set you up for success on your Salesforce Einstein journey.