Salesforce skills, and particularly those of Salesforce architects, continue to grow in demand as the Salesforce ecosystem continues to grow all over the globe. This book focuses on one topic area of the Salesforce architect curriculum, namely data architecture. The Salesforce Certified Data Architect exam may seem a little daunting when reading the exam outline for the first time (I certainly thought so). But it needn't be. I was lucky to be able to pass the exam the first time, and that was possible by gathering information and going through the Salesforce documentation over several months. This book is the book I wish I'd had when studying for the exam, because it specifically covers the material necessary for the theory side of the exam.

We'll start by going through each of the areas covered in the exam outline in turn, from data modeling, master data management, Salesforce data management, data governance and large data volumes to data migration. Understanding these is pivotal to getting the theory tested in the exam covered. Moreover, the theory can be directly applied to the solutions you build and maintain in your role as a Salesforce architect.

We then turn our attention to applying concepts through additional topics that, while not always directly called out in the syllabus, will round out your knowledge of applying Salesforce data principles. These include a deeper dive into accounts and contacts, APIs and Apex, tuning performance, backup and restore, and territory management. Each of these topics will explain how the data model, sharing, and therefore any solutions built with these topics in mind are affected.

Lastly, we'll look at practice questions (with answers) and some revision aides. By the end of this book, you'll have covered the topics required to pass the Salesforce Certified Data Architect exam and also be able to implement Salesforce data design best practices in your day-to-day role as a Salesforce architect.