What Worked For Me in Getting Salesforce.com Certified

Like I promised, here goes my post about how I studied for the Salesforce.com Certified Force.com Developer certification. I’ll enumerate the resources that really helped me in answering those questions. I think what I have is credible enough, because I passed the exam the first time I took it. I actually was hesitant to take it because when I search the net, many people have taken it like thrice to pass it. Good thing I read those, which made me study a lot, $200 is a lot of money to waste. On the list are –

1. Salesforce.com Documentation – http://wiki.developerforce.com/index.php/Documentation

a. Help & Training – you see this on your app setup, which is also available in a compiled PDF version; login to your org, and you will see a link to download the PDF version – you should know this if you are really into SFDC – you’ll just have to dig every detail;
b. Force.com Fundamentals – http://www.salesforce.com/us/developer/docs/fundamentals/index.htm
c. Force.com Workbook – http://www.salesforce.com/us/developer/docs/workbook/workbook.pdf

2.  iTunes SFDC Training & Cert – this is fun; Chris, the instructor, really does a good job. His discussions will make it easier to remember and helps you not get bored over the material. His students has these really crazy questions, but in the end, you’ll realize, it helps a lot.


Some notes that might also be helpful –

1. Practice answering mocks under time pressure. It’s 60 Q’s in 90 mins, that’s 1.5 mins per question. Questions may not be as hard as you’d expect them to be, but it will eat up your time understanding the requirements/constraints presented in each situation. Maybe only 10-15 out of 60 Q’s are enumeration/identification type of questions.
2. Develop a complete application. It’s easy if you’d come across the situations given, but if not, thinking about the design implications will eat up your time. Having everything visual in your head makes it really easy.
3. Make sure you know everything that can be done in your App/Security menu.
4. When studying, you should differentiate if it’s ADMIN or DEV stuff.
5. There are key words i.e. time-based workflow for reminder/follow-up mails, validation rules for check before write to DB;


This is just from my point of view, you may have an easier time studying for it, but this is what I think worked for me. Hope this would help people out there.