The Assessment Report That Changed Everything

The Initial Ask

Global financial services firm, 4,200 employees, 6 Salesforce orgs accumulated over 8 years through acquisitions.

Request: "We need to consolidate into one org. Can you migrate us?"

Our answer: "Let's assess first."

Discovery Scope (2 weeks, $24,000)

Data Audit

• Object/field inventory across all 6 orgs
• Record volumes and growth rates
• Integration mapping
• Data lineage and dependencies

Usage Analysis

• Login frequency per org
• Active user counts (30/90/365 days)
• Report/dashboard utilization
• Apex/Flow execution stats

Cost Breakdown

• License costs per org
• Add-on products (CPQ, Marketing Cloud, etc.)
• Storage/API limits and overages
• AppExchange licenses

What We Found

Org 1 (HQ): Active

• 2,100 active users
• 47M Account/Contact/Opportunity records
• 92 integrations
• Annual cost: $1.8M licenses + $420K storage/API

Org 2 (Acquisition 2019): Abandoned

• 14 logins in last 90 days (all admins checking status)
• No business process running
• Data replicated to Org 1 in 2021
• Annual cost: $340K (420 licenses no one uses)

Org 3 (EMEA): Semi-Active

• 380 active users
• GDPR-isolated data (required by Legal)
• Cannot merge into HQ without violating data residency
• Annual cost: $520K

Org 4 (Legacy CRM Replacement): Zombie

• 63 logins last 90 days
• All users also have accounts in Org 1
• Used for one legacy reporting dashboard (5 viewers)
• Annual cost: $280K

Org 5 (Sandbox promoted to prod in 2020): Mistake

• Created during pandemic for "temporary remote sales tracking"
• 118 users, but 96% of activity is automated (nightly batch jobs syncing to Org 1)
• Annual cost: $190K

Org 6 (Partner Portal): Required

• 840 partner community users
• Cannot merge into HQ without license cost explosion
• Annual cost: $140K (community licenses cheaper than Enterprise)

The Math

Total annual Salesforce spend: $3.69M

Orgs that could be decommissioned immediately: 2, 4, 5 = $810K/year savings

Orgs that should remain separate: 3 (GDPR), 6 (partner licensing) = $660K/year

Remaining after cleanup: HQ org only = $2.22M/year

Consolidation Cost Estimate

If they had proceeded with their original plan to consolidate all 6 orgs into one:

• Data migration: $1.2M–$1.8M
• Metadata merge/deduplication: $600K–$900K
• Integration rewiring: $400K–$700K
• UAT and cutover: $200K–$400K
• Total: $2.4M–$3.8M
• Timeline: 14–18 months

What We Recommended Instead

Phase 1: Immediate Decommission (4 weeks, $85K)

• Export compliance archives from Orgs 2, 4, 5
• Shut down orgs
• Redirect users to Org 1
• Savings: $810K/year starting month 2

Phase 2: Sync EMEA/Partner (8 weeks, $140K)

• Deploy Multi-Org Sync Center for Orgs 1 ↔ 3 (EMEA) and 1 ↔ 6 (Partner)
• Bidirectional Account/Contact/Opportunity sync with GDPR field masking
• Keep orgs separate but data synchronized

Phase 3: Consolidate Only If It Makes Sense Later

• Revisit in 12 months after GDPR/partner licensing models change
• Current state is stable and $2.1M cheaper annually than original 6-org sprawl

Outcome

• Total project cost: $249K (assessment + decommission + sync deployment)
• Annual savings: $810K from decommissioned orgs
• Avoided wasteful consolidation: saved $2.4M–$3.8M project cost
• Timeline: 12 weeks vs. 14–18 months
• ROI: 3.25x in year one; break-even in 4 months

The Report That Changed Their Mind

The assessment included:

• Per-org cost breakdown with license utilization heatmaps
• Login activity charts (90-day rolling averages)
• Data lineage diagrams showing which orgs are upstream/downstream
• 3 scenarios: consolidate all, sync only, decommission + sync
• Risk matrix for GDPR/partner licensing

CFO read it, called Legal and Compliance, then called us: "Do the decommission plan. Now."

Red Flags We Look For

• Orgs with <20% login rate over 90 days
• License counts that haven't changed in 2+ years despite user churn
• Storage costs growing but record counts flat (indicates replication, not usage)
• AppExchange subscriptions with zero API calls in 30 days
• Integrations pointing to decommissioned systems

Why Assessments Matter

You don't know what you don't know. This client thought they had 6 active orgs. They actually had:

• 1 production org (HQ)
• 2 required regional/partner orgs
• 3 expensive mistakes ($810K/year)

$24K assessment saved them $2.1M annually and avoided a $2.4M–$3.8M failed consolidation project.