Most firms only implement Salesforce once, which means most firms have no reference point for what normal ownership actually looks like a year or two later. This page collects the questions we hear most often from financial services clients who are living with Salesforce Financial Services Cloud day to day, not evaluating it for the first time. If you already know you want an ongoing partner and want to see what Orbit’s managed services actually include, start there. Otherwise, read on.
System Health & Maintenance
Is it normal for a Salesforce org to develop problems over time, even if nobody did anything wrong?
Yes. Every Salesforce org accumulates complexity as your business changes: new products, new regulations, new integrations, staff turnover, three major platform releases a year. None of that is a sign of a bad implementation. It’s the normal lifecycle of any system that’s actually being used. The problem isn’t that issues appear, it’s that most firms don’t have anyone dedicated to catching them before they compound. That’s the gap Orbit’s ongoing care model is built to close.
Is it normal for every seasonal Salesforce release to require security or configuration updates on our end?
Yes, and it’s one of the most overlooked maintenance costs of owning Salesforce. Salesforce ships three major releases a year plus continuous security patches, and each one can change default behavior, deprecate features, or require a configuration review to stay compliant. Orbit monitors every release cycle and Agentforce rollout on your behalf, so changes get reviewed and applied deliberately instead of discovered after something breaks.
Is it normal for automations to start breaking about a year after go-live?
Yes. This is one of the most common patterns we see. Automations are usually built to match the business as it existed at go-live, and a year of new products, new team members, and process changes is enough to expose edge cases nobody tested for originally. Orbit’s release readiness and ongoing monitoring catch this drift before it turns into a client-facing problem.
How much technical debt is normal to accumulate in the first 12-18 months?
Some is unavoidable. Every implementation makes reasonable trade-offs under a deadline that need revisiting later. What’s not normal is technical debt nobody’s tracking. A healthy org has a running list of “we did this quickly, here’s why, here’s when we should revisit it.” Orbit’s Institutional Memory value lever exists specifically to keep that list alive instead of letting it live in one person’s head.
Is it normal to not fully understand why past customizations were built the way they were?
Very normal, especially after any staff turnover, and it’s one of the most expensive problems in Salesforce ownership, because teams end up afraid to touch configurations they don’t understand. Orbit’s Orbit Portal captures the design rationale behind decisions as they’re made, so “why is it built this way” has a documented answer instead of becoming institutional folklore.
How do we know if our Salesforce org has gotten “too customized”?
A reasonable rule of thumb: if a routine change now requires a specialist to investigate side effects before anyone will approve it, or if new hires need weeks just to understand how your org differs from standard Salesforce, that’s over-customization. It’s rarely something that happened all at once, it accumulates. A Bilan de santé de Salesforce is the fastest way to get an honest answer, and it’s the first thing Orbit does with a new client.
People, Adoption & Process
Is it normal for users to complain about Salesforce, or is that a sign something’s actually broken?
Some grumbling is normal. Any system asks people to change how they work. But persistent complaints, especially about slow performance, confusing screens, or “having to do it twice,” are usually a signal that the system has drifted from how the team actually operates day to day. Orbit treats sustained user complaints as a diagnostic signal, not background noise, and includes adoption coaching as part of ongoing support rather than a one-time training event.
Why do our advisors keep reverting to spreadsheets even though we have Salesforce?
It’s almost always a sign that Salesforce isn’t matching how advisors actually work, not that advisors are resistant to change. When a field, a workflow, or a report doesn’t reflect reality, people quietly route around it, and spreadsheets are the path of least resistance. Orbit treats this as an adoption and configuration signal worth investigating, not a training problem to lecture your way out of.
Is it normal for user adoption to decline after the first few months post-launch?
Yes, and it tends to happen right when initial training momentum fades and the system stops getting active attention. Adoption isn’t a one-time achievement at go-live, it’s something that needs to be maintained the same way the platform itself does. Orbit builds ongoing adoption coaching into every tier rather than treating it as a separate, optional service.
Cost, Contracts & Vendor Relationships
Is it normal for our Salesforce account executive to change every few months?
Unfortunately, yes. AE turnover at Salesforce is common, and it’s one of the quieter frustrations of being a Salesforce customer, since your commercial relationship keeps resetting even when your technical needs don’t. Orbit exists specifically to be the constant on your side of that relationship: a dedicated Account Manager and an Orbit Portal that preserves your project history, decisions, and context regardless of who you’re talking to at Salesforce.
Is it normal to see unexpectedly high Salesforce data storage bills?
It’s extremely common, and almost always fixable. Data storage costs creep up as attachments, activity history, and old records accumulate without anyone actively managing retention. Most firms don’t realize how much they’re paying until the bill jumps. Navirum has helped clients cut Salesforce storage costs by up to 90% through archiving and AWS-based storage strategies; Orbit builds that kind of review into ongoing maintenance instead of waiting for a surprise invoice to trigger it.
Is it normal to feel uneasy heading into a Salesforce contract renewal?
Yes, and it’s one of the most common anxieties clients bring to us. Renewal negotiations are opaque by design, and most firms only go through one every year or two, so there’s rarely a clear reference point for what’s actually realistic to ask for. This is somewhere Orbit adds value beyond day-to-day admin work: our team includes former Salesforce employees who’ve been on the inside of thousands of these conversations, and we give clients direct input on what’s normal, what’s negotiable, and where the real leverage is before you’re in the room, on top of the usage reporting and no-lock-in commercial model that make the case in the first place.
AI Tools & Governance
Is it normal for advisors and staff to want to connect other tools, including AI assistants like ChatGPT or Claude, to Salesforce?
Yes, and it’s becoming more common by the month. AI does not solve a messy data problem, it makes the mess faster, and that is exactly what happens when individual advisors or staff connect outside AI tools to client data on their own initiative. AI assistants and LLM-based tools have made it easier than ever for an individual advisor or staff member to connect outside systems to client data, often with good intentions and zero visibility for IT or compliance. This is an AI risk governance question, not a technology question, and it isn’t a yes-or-no answer; it depends on the role, the data involved, and your regulatory obligations, and it needs to be governed deliberately rather than decided case by case in the moment. Every financial services firm needs a clear, role-based IT and AI usage policy that spells out what’s permitted, and creating and maintaining that policy, both general IT governance and AI-specific guidelines, is part of Orbit’s ongoing service, not a one-time document that goes stale.
The Big Picture
Is it normal to feel like we’ve outgrown our original implementation?
Extremely common, and usually a good sign. It means your business has grown. Most implementations are scoped for the firm as it existed at the time, and a firm that’s added products, headcount, or lines of business will eventually need its Salesforce environment to catch up. Orbit’s roadmap development is built for exactly this: revisiting the platform as the business changes instead of treating go-live as the finish line.
What does healthy, ongoing Salesforce maintenance actually look like?
In practice: someone monitoring each seasonal release before it hits your org, a documented reason behind every customization, response times you can count on when something breaks, adoption that’s actively supported rather than assumed, and a clear view of what you’re paying for and why. Most firms only find out what “healthy” looks like by comparing it to what they’ve been living with, which is exactly why the Orbit Support Plans are built around these specific commitments.
How do we know if we need more support than we currently have?
If any of the questions above sound familiar, that’s usually the signal. Not a single dramatic failure, but a slow accumulation of small workarounds, unanswered questions, and things nobody’s quite sure are normal. That’s exactly the gap Orbit was built to close, and it’s worth reading more before deciding anything.
Want to go deeper?
This page is meant to answer the questions nobody quite asks out loud. For the fuller picture of what long-term Salesforce ownership actually looks like, and how firms create real value well past go-live, read Salesforce Managed Services for Financial Services Firms: How to Create Long Term Value After Go Live.
Stay in the loop: Subscribe to the Navirum newsletter for insights like this one as they publish, or if you want executive-level perspective on where IT strategy for financial services is heading, join the FinSight Series for regular sessions with industry leaders.
When you’re ready to see what ongoing support actually includes, explore Orbit Managed Services.
