Salesforce has confirmed that it is aiming to recruit more than 1,000 workers to help keep up with the demand for its Agentforce solution.
Having gone live at the end of last month, Agentforce is a new platform layer that allows companies to easily scope, test, and deploy ready-to-use AI agents that enhance Salesforce workflows.
Powered by generative AI (GenAI), its low/no-code Agent Builder also allows brands to create custom AI agents for specific tasks and connect various functions within the Salesforce ecosystem.
According to Bloomberg, Marc Benioff, CEO of Salesforce, is very enthusiastic about how the product has been received so far:
Agentforce became available just two weeks ago and we’re already hearing incredible feedback from our customers.
Indeed, the CEO is now looking to capitalize on this “amazing momentum” by hiring employees to specifically drive sales of the vendor’s latest innovation.
This onboarding initiative follows the addition of 1,839 new employees in March, which brought Salesforce’s workforce to 72,682.
The combination of these two recruitment measures means the company is well on its way to fulfilling the pledge made by Benioff in September of last year to bring in 3,300 new employees.
Indeed, this illustrates Benioff’s renewed commitment to “growing the company,” having made over 10 percent of its staff (8,000) redundant across the first eight months of 2023.
Agentforce: Salesforce’s Golden Goose
While it’s far from unusual for a CX tech vendor to promote and champion their new products, Agentforce seems to be receiving a massive push.
Salesforce initially announced the launch of the solution during its Dreamforce conference, where it showcased the tool’s credentials by helping customers create over 10,000 AI agents across various industries and use cases.
In addition, the company has over 20 planned Agentforce tour events throughout December, where it will be shopping the product to customers in cities such as New York, London, and Tokyo.
And then, of course, there have been Benioff’s repeated criticisms of Microsoft.
Having thrown the first punch during Salesforce’s earnings call back in August when he claimed that Microsoft had “disappointed so many customers with AI,” the CEO has continued with a steady stream of insults over the past three months.
In an X post, Benioff criticized Microsoft Copilot, calling it inaccurate, prone to data leaks, and requiring users to create custom language models.
He also likened his competitor’s tool to “Clippy 2.0”, referencing Microsoft’s outdated, often unhelpful virtual assistant from the early 2000s.
The fact that the CEO’s criticism of Microsoft coincides with Salesforce’s release of Agentforce seems too deliberate to be a coincidence.
It’s possible to argue that in repeatedly disparaging one of the solution’s key competitors, Benioff is intentionally attempting to draw attention to Agentforce.
Whether the attacks on Microsoft were part of the wider Agentforce marketing strategy or not, the overall promotion of the solution certainly seems to be impressing investors, with the company’s share price having risen by almost 18 percent in the past month.
It will be interesting to see whether the hype that the vendor has built up around its latest release translates to increased usage and sales.
More News from Salesforce
In an ironic twist, Salesforce recently received a taste of its own medicine when Shopify took a shot at the CRM giant, claiming that it had poached “hundreds” of its customers.
Traditionally known for supporting small businesses, Shopify is now actively targeting large enterprises.
So far, it has attracted major brands like Toys “R” Us and Casper from Salesforce as part of a “mass migration” strategy, emphasizing its competitive pricing to draw clients away from established enterprise platforms.
