Salesforce Certification Updates: April 2022

Salesforce certification is well-known for improving your profile and providing high-level abilities by offering hands-on Salesforce certification expertise as well as a competitive advantage that leads to new possibilities. You may, however, begin preparing for a skill-based certification and accelerate your professional path. This enables you to apply the knowledge you’ve gained to complicated, real-world business situations. But what about the other steps, such as keeping your certificates up to date, checking for upgrades, and retiring exams?

Indeed, Salesforce always keeps up with the latest technologies and developments in order to keep everything on track. The certification and its content, as well as the exam retirement, must be updated to reflect current technologies. So that applicants can benefit from the upgrade by learning new skills. To learn more about this, we’ll go through all of the Salesforce Certification examinations in this blog, along with their most up-to-date information. Let’s start by looking at the exam modifications and other key changes.

Salesforce Certification: What’s new?

We all know that Salesforce certification is essential for proving technical abilities and cloud competence in order to advance in your profession. Furthermore, this helps professionals in identifying in-demand talents and organizations for forming successful cloud teams. As a result, modifications are required to keep up with the current technology.

1. Modifications in the Salesforce Certification Expiration

To keep your Salesforce Certification credentials, you must complete release-specific Trailhead modules, according to Salesforce. All of your certificates kept by that module will expire if you don’t complete your needed maintenance by the due date. Your Advanced Administrator and Sales Cloud Consultant credentials, for example, will expire if your Administrator credential expires. If this happens, you’ll have to re-earn each certification by taking the entire, proctored tests again.

You will receive email reminders whenever your certification is about to expire, reminding you to complete your maintenance. You should not, however, depend solely on these email reminders; it is your obligation to perform your maintenance before the given deadline. Let’s check the expiration details!

– Platform Developer II Certification Expiration

• If you have the Salesforce Certified Platform Developer I and also the Salesforce Certified Platform Developer II credentials, the Platform Developer II accreditation will expire.
  • However, to be certified, you must retake both Platform Developer I and Platform Developer II. The Advanced Apex Specialist Superbadge will not have to be retaken.

– B2C Solution Architect Certification Expiration

• If you have the Salesforce Certified B2C Solution Architect credential and your Salesforce Certified Integration Architect, Marketing Cloud Email Specialist, or Platform App Builder credentials expire, the B2C Solution Architect credential will also expire.
  • However, to be qualified, you must first recertify as a Salesforce Certified Integration Architecture Designer, Marketing Cloud Email Specialist, or Platform App Builder, as well as complete the B2C Solution Architect test.

– B2B Solution Architect Certification Expiration

• If you have the Salesforce Certified Platform App Builder, Platform Developer I, Data Architect, or Sharing and Visibility Architect certificate and it expires, the B2B Solution Architect credential will also expire.
  • However, to be qualified, you must first recertify as a Salesforce Certified Platform App Builder, Platform Developer I, Data Architect, or Sharing and Visibility Architect, as well as complete the B2B Solution Architect exam.

– Application and System Architect Certification Expiration

• If any of the prerequisites for the Salesforce Certified Application Architect or Salesforce Certified System Architect credentials expire, the credentials for Application and System Architect will as well.
• The Salesforce Certified Application and/or System Architect credential will be immediately re-earned when you re-earn the expired certification(s).

– Technical Architect Certification Expiration

• When both your Salesforce Certified Application Architect and Salesforce Certified System Architect credentials expire, the Salesforce Certified Technical Architect certificate will also expire.
• After that, you’ll need to recertify as a Salesforce Certified Application or System Architect, as well as a Salesforce Certified Technical Architect.

2. Maintaining Certifications Process

You must complete Trailhead maintenance modules relevant to your Salesforce certification(s) in order to keep your certification(s) current. Every year, one maintenance module must be completed for all certifications. You may check your certification status on your “Trailblazer.me” profile once the release modules are available, and you will get an email with all the information you need to perform your maintenance.

Further, while these email reminders are useful, you should not rely only on them; it is your obligation to complete your maintenance modules before the given date. If you don’t finish your maintenance module(s) by the deadline, all certifications associated with that module will expire or, in certain situations, be suspended.

Note:

• You must still perform entry-level maintenance to maintain all of your certifications if you gain a new higher-level or advanced certification (eg. Certified Administrator is entry-level and maintains the Certified Advanced Administrator certification).

The following is a list of Salesforce certifications sorted by role, as well as the Trailhead maintenance courses necessary to keep them up to date, and when those modules will be released.

Maintenance for Administrator Certifications:

Maintenance for Architect Certifications:

Maintenance for Consultant Certifications:

Maintenance for Designer Certifications:

Maintenance for Developer Certifications:

Maintenance for Marketing Certifications:

3. Salesforce Retired Certifications

The Salesforce Certification potentially retires certifications to fit with current product offerings as the Salesforce Platform and products evolve. When a certification is retired, it is no longer recognized by the system, is no longer shown on the verification page, and is no longer used in Partner Value Scores. Salesforce will give prior warning and a recommended pathway for anyone who possesses a certification that is about to retire. However, the following Salesforce Credentials have been withdrawn from the program and are no longer recognized:

• Salesforce Certified Consultant
• Salesforce Certified Force.com Developer
• Next, Salesforce Certified Force.com Advanced Developer
• Salesforce Certified Marketing Cloud Social Specialist
• Then, Salesforce Certified Mobile Solution Architecture Designer
• Salesforce Accredited Sales Professional
• Next, Salesforce Accredited B2B Commerce Administrator
• Salesforce Accredited B2B Commerce Developer

Above, we have understood the modifications in the certification maintenance process and the exams that are retired. Now, let’s check the list of Salesforce Active Certifications.

Salesforce Certification: Roles Based Exam

When it comes to Salesforce certification, it is divided into six jobs, each of which has its own examination. This includes the following:

1. Salesforce Administrator

2. Salesforce Architect

3. Salesforce Developer

4. Salesforce Marketer

5. Salesforce Consultant

6. Salesforce Designer

How to verify Certification Status?

For checking the certification maintenance status, you can use:

• Firstly, Trailblazer.me profile
• Secondly, the Salesforce credentials verification page

Further, on your Trailblazer.me profile, check for certifications. After that, for every certification, you will see:

• Firstly, the certification name
• Secondly, certification dates
• Thirdly, the certification description
• Lastly, certification maintenance status 
  • In the Certification status you can see:
    • Firstly, Active. This means certification is up-to-date.
    • Secondly, Maintenance Due. This means your certification has maintenance due.
    • Thirdly, Expiring Soon. This means your certification is at risk of expiring.
    • Next, Expired. This means your certification is expired due to incomplete maintenance.
    • Lastly, Retired. This means that the certification is no longer available.

Final Words

We’ve gone through the changes and updates to Salesforce certification and training above. Salesforce makes these changes as part of its exams and training to keep current with the latest technologies. Individuals who achieve this certification will also benefit from the enhancement of more advanced abilities. Make use of the given information to become acquainted with Salesforce’s most recent developments. Also, identify the right exam for you and begin studying to become Salesforce professional.