Your Salesforce administrator resume needs to show a balance between the soft skills needed to train employees and the hard skills needed to handle data analytics. Demonstrating you can work well with people and get deep into data to draw valuable conclusions isn’t easy. But, it’s possible, and when you get it just right you’ll stand out as a top candidate.

This guide will walk you through all the subtle elements you need to perfect to get the Salesforce administrator job you want. From understanding how to make a strong first impression to getting technical to overcome ATS (don’t worry if you’ve never heard of them), we’ve put together all the expert advice you need.

What you’ll learn in this guide:

• How to use resume examples to get started
• The three tricks to getting past ATS
• How to get the attention of recruiters
• What formatting rules you need to follow
• What to include about your education
• How you can make your skills stand out
• How you should be framing your achievements
• Why your resume should begin with an objective or summary
• What to do if you don’t have much experience
• How you can make the whole resume creation process easier

Salesforce administrator resume template examples

If your resume is going to stand out from the competition, you need to begin by getting a sense for what that competition might look like. You can also use the examples below to get some inspiration for your own resume. Gaining some perspective before starting to write is a critical step to creating a better resume.

As you look over the examples we’ve selected, begin taking notes about what stands out. Which elements do you want to incorporate into your Salesforce administrator resume? You can use these notes to help avoid the challenge of beginning with a blank page.

[Examples]

How to write a job-winning salesforce administrator resume

You wouldn’t create the same user profiles, data analysis strategy, or anything else for completely different clients. Tailoring your work to the audience will always make it more effective and creating your resume is no different. So before you start writing, it’s important to begin by understanding the two main audiences you’ll need to appeal to.

3 steps to get your resume past ATS

You’ll need to begin by understanding Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS). 99% of the Fortune 500 use them, so as a Salesforce administrator, your resume is almost guaranteed to be evaluated by one. In short, ATS are algorithms which use artificial intelligence to scan huge numbers of resumes and quickly sort them into “review” and “don’t review” piles.

They do this by using natural language processing to translate the information on your resume into criteria which it can compare against the requirements it’s been given. The issue is that these algorithms aren’t perfect and can often misinterpret what you’ve written, leading to resumes like yours getting accidentally rejected. So what can you do to avoid this? We’ve broken it down into 3 simple steps.

1. Stick to .pdf, .doc, and .docx files. While there are dozens of different ATS companies out there and each one works a bit differently, these are the filetypes nearly all are designed to read. Submitting your resume as one of these three will ensure it’s not rejected because the ATS doesn’t work with that file type.
2. Create your resume with an ATS-friendly resume builder. Another consideration is the way the data is structured within the file you submit. Elements like charts or columns can confuse ATS and lead to rejection. The easiest way around this is to simply use a resume builder specifically designed to produce ATS-optimized files.
3. Use keyword techniques to “game the system.” You already know that ATS will scan your resume looking for specific skills and qualifications to determine whether your resume should be rejected or not. By knowing what the ATS are searching for and ensuring they find it on your resume, you’ll increase your chances of getting hired. The best way to do this is by looking at the job description and making a list of likely criteria the ATS will search for based on what’s written there.

What will the recruiters pay closest attention to in your salesforce administrator resume?

Once your resume sails past ATS it still needs to impress a recruiter. The first step in appealing to a recruiter is understanding them. Think back to the last time you were forced to read an overly long and poorly written document to learn some important information. That’s how most recruiters feel. To appeal to them, make sure your resume makes their job easier.

That means combining modern design, concise error-free writing, and well-structured information. If reading your resume isn’t a chore, that recruiter will think of you much more positively.

Fortunately, you’ve already taken one big step in this direction by getting keywords into your resume based on the job description’s requirements. We’ll go through other tips throughout this guide, but as often as possible as you create your resume, look back through it from the recruiter’s perspective. It can also help to ask a fiend (especially one with an HR background) to do this for you, as it will be easier for them to examine from an outside perspective.

How should you format your resume?

While most of us don’t think about it when creating a resume, formatting is critical. It’s what determines the order in which information gets across to the reader. You don’t start reading a book from the conclusion and you don’t want to begin your resume with the wrong information either.

Overall, the rule to follow here is “put the more important information towards the top.” This is about making it easy for the recruiter to find the most critical facts about you as a candidate. Burying the lede here is not going to do you any favors. Following this rule also helps you ensure recruiters quickly form a good first impression of you as a candidate (more on how to do this with an objective or summary below).

How long should a Salesforce administrator resume be?

The internet is full of advice telling you to aim for specific page numbers, but the real rule to follow is simple: as short as possible. Even with ATS eliminating many incoming resumes, recruiters still have to review a lot of them. Ensuring your resume is concise and only contains relevant information will go a long way towards earning their appreciation. 

One way to do this is to look at every section and piece of information and ask yourself whether it adds value to your resume. If it doesn’t then delete it.

Which sections should be included in a resume?

These are the sections which you should consider adding. Just be sure to follow the rule about adding value and not include all of them out of habit.

• Resume objective or summary
• Work experience
• Achievements
• Education and certifications
• Hard skills
• Soft Skills

How to list your education and certifications

Education is perhaps the most common case of someone including a section out of habit when it doesn’t really add anything to the resume. If your education is old or unrelated to your work as a Salesforce Administrator, you probably don’t need to include it (unless, for example, the job specifically requires a bachelor's degree of some kind).

BA in History

Christopher Newport University

2007-2011

-Phi Alpha Theta History Honor Society Member

-Captain of the University Rugby Team

-Average GPA of 3.8

This example shows all the mistakes one can easily make in an education section. This degree is not relevant to Salesforce administration, was obtained almost a decade ago, and contains further details which don’t add anything of value. It’s possible the captain experience could be used to emphasize leadership and teamwork, but that would need to be contextualized (more on how to do that in the next section). By itself, it doesn’t mean very much.

BS in Business Administration

The University of Michigan

2013-2017

-Thesis focused on how AI will affect customer relations

This example decides to focus, leaving out a lot of information and instead only conveying what’s needed. Here, the recruiter needs to know you’ve got a relevant degree and whether any specific work you did for that degree relates to your work was a Salesforce Administrator. The chance that the recruiter cares about your GPA or extracurriculars is near 0.

However, considering how hard it is to find a formal university degree directly related to Salesforce administrator work, certifications and trainings become more valuable. They require a smaller time commitment but still demonstrate that you’ve gone out of your way to enhance your skills and make it easy for the recruiter to comprehend your abilities.

Certifications to consider including

• Salesforce’s Administrator Certification
• Certified Analytics Professional (CAP)
• IBCT Associate Trainer Certification

How to make your skills more effective

The reason education and certifications are so important is that it’s easy to simply state that you have a skill (particularly a soft skill). This presents a challenge for recruiters, who need to find a way to test your actual abilities. Obviously this creates a lot of extra work and uncertainty on their end.

You can make this easier for them by providing concrete examples of your skills whenever possible. Beyond making the recruiter's job easier, examples like this make your resume and skills more memorable. It’s easy to skim over a skills list, but telling stories and examples will make a recruiter stop and read. They make your resume more interesting, human, and memorable as a candidate. Now, let’s see that in action.

Excellent team manager

As mentioned, listing skills like this is important if they’re mentioned in the job ad because of ATS, but you can do better. Let’s look at an improved version and see the difference a concrete example makes.

Excellent team manager

- Took over management of the worst performing sales team at OMX Industries and got it into the top 10% within 9 months,

Even though this example isn’t from a Salesforce administrator role specifically, it still makes it clear that this candidate knows how to run an effective team and build a strong dynamic. It’s also potentially the beginning of a question in an interview, focusing the attention on your accomplishments.

The best Salesforce administrator hard skills to include

• Written and verbal communication
• Creative problem solving
• Working well on a team
• Attention to detail

The best Salesforce administrator hard skills to include

• Salesforce
• Developing and running trainings
• Data analytics
• Agile
• Process optimization
• Business processes and administration
• Network configuration

How to highlight your achievements

You can make your achievements stand out by using the same principles you just applied to your skills. By being specific about what you did and what you achieved instead of listing your responsibilities like most of your competition, your resume will stand out. Here’s an example to illustrate this.

Responsible for training sales teams in Salesforce.

The thing to remember here is, even if this candidate did an objectively terrible job with these trainings and was even fired for it, this statement would still be true. That’s why responsibility statements like this don’t mean much to the average recruiter. Worse, they can annoy recruiters because information like this effectively wastes their valuable time. But what would this achievement look like reframed?

Trained 1,200 Salesforce users in 5 years, taking a 2 week course and getting it down to 1 week while maintaining final test performance.

Here, we get a sense of the scale of the work done and how this candidate focused on improving bottom-line performance for their employer. A recruiter can read this story and get a sense of this candidate seeing a problem, developing a solution, and successfully implementing that solution instead of simply being responsible for something. 

As a result, the interview with this candidate is more likely to begin with something like “you were the candidate who cut training time in half, explain how you did that.”

The best way to begin your resume

As we’ve alluded to in this guide, your resume is playing a mental game with the recruiter. You want to be a memorable candidate when you’re competing with dozens or more fellow Salesforce administrators. One of the most effective ways to make yourself memorable is to make a strong first impression. But this is difficult when your resume begins with something like your work experience.

This is where resume objectives and summaries come in. These sections are more flexible and allow you to begin by making a case for yourself as a candidate, emphasizing your strongest qualities so they get more focus from the recruiter.

The difference between a resume objective and summary is mostly about length. A resume objective is a single sentence and more narrowly focused on explaining who you are and what you aim to achieve with your resume. A resume summary on the other hand can be a few sentences and dive into your main strengths as a candidate. 

Alternatively a summary can be used to explain questions which you think will likely arise elsewhere in the resume. For example, why you chose to change careers or why there’s a gap in your work history. By getting ahead of these questions instead of allowing a recruiter’s imagination to take over and consider them, you’ll be in a stronger position. 

How to write a resume objective

Remember, a resume objective should be concise and packed with useful information. It also needs to be well written. The last thing you want is for a recruiter to have to re-read the first sentence of your resume to make sure they understood it. For a role with as much communication as a Salesforce administrator, that’s a very bad first impression.

Highly skilled Salesforce administrator with experience creating training programs, managing the entire sales process, data analytics, creative problem solving, and business administration.

This resume objective is basically a list of skills. That’s why it’s not effective, it’s vague about explaining who this candidate is, mentions nothing about their objective, and instead focuses on a long list. For this reason, it begins a resume by wasting the recruiter’s time. Now let’s compare that to an improved version.

Salesforce administrator with 4 years experience at IGA Engineering building scalable Salesforce training systems looking to use this experience to help Orion Software scale its sales efforts.

This example focuses on explaining what experience the candidate has and how they plan on using it at this new prospective employer. It also indicates that this resume has been customized for that specific role (one of the most important ways to improve your chances of getting hired). 

How to write a resume summary

Just because a resume summary can be longer doesn’t mean it should ramble on. It still needs to be concise to avoid starting your resume off with a short story.

After years of working in sales at Microsoft I decided to obtain a Salesforce Administrator Certification and begin a new career. Now, as I’m coming close to obtaining that certification, I’m looking for a role with room for growth to begin this new phase. I’m looking forward to learning more about your company and the opportunities it can provide.

Aside from the basic mistake of writing in the first person instead of the third person, this resume summary focuses far too much on what the candidate wants from an employer and not what they can provide. This communicates that the candidate is far more focused on taking than giving, not exactly what an employer looks for in a position this important. Now let’s compare that summary to a reworked version.

Sales professional with 5 years experience at Microsoft now transitioning into a Salesforce administrator role. Will use my sales experience to better craft training and administrative processes which work for sales teams. Currently pursuing Salesforce Administration and CAP Certifications to limit training needed to begin work at Amadeus Ventures Inc. 

Instead of wasting space with vague statements, this resume summary simply states the person’s existing experience, how they think that experience will help them as they change careers, and what they’re doing to prepare for the change. It tells a focused story, which makes reading the rest of the resume easier because the reader already has a strong sense of who the candidate is.

How to write a salesforce administrator resume when you have little or no experience

If you’re looking for your first role as a Salesforce administrator, you need to find effective ways to show you can overcome your lack of experience. The thing to bear in mind is that companies understand that you can be trained in the technical skills needed, training someone to have the right attitude is a different matter.

So, focus on concrete examples which show you have all the critical soft skills to be an excellent Salesforce administrator. Then, try obtaining certifications to show that although you don’t have much practical work experience, you’re working to get the skills you need. Even if you haven’t completed a certification by the time you apply, it’s worth mentioning that you’re actively pursuing it.

How to make your resume stand out

Ultimately, your resume should stand out based on its content. We’ve outlined all the subtle ways you can use examples, objectives, achievements, etc. to make your resume unique amongst its competition. But the thing we haven’t mentioned is design. 

Imagine you’re a recruiter who needs to review dozens of resumes a day. If all of them are just blocks of text in Word documents, their eyes will start to glaze over pretty fast. That’s why utilizing clean and modern design is about more than just aesthetics. It communicates that you put in extra effort (a great quality in a Salesforce administrator), and it makes the process of reviewing your resume easier on a recruiter’s tired eyes. But how do you get quality design for your resume?

How using a resume builder saves you time and effort

With so many details to get right, creating the perfect Salesforce administrator resume takes time. You need every time-saving tool you can get. With this in mind, using a powerful resume builder like Resumebuild.com is a no-brainer.

It allows you to feel confident your resume file is ATS-optimized, get easy access to modern resume templates to stand out from the competition, and simplifies the process of creating many custom resumes for each role. There’s no reason to waste more time fiddling with formatting in Word or trying to get a random template you found to fit the information you need it to fit. Resumebuild.com lets you skip that stress and get right to the resume that will get you hired