Khoros to Salesforce Experience Cloud Migration: How AC Helped Flexera Address Common Challenges

Do you feel like your Khoros journey makes you pay a premium? Or you wait for the answer from their customer support for a long time to troubleshoot an issue? Maybe you simply don’t want to move to their new Aurora version (which is a headache, giving that you have to move loads of data too)? Then you’ve landed on the right page.

Dive into this article as we guide you through the process of migration from Khoros to Salesforce by showcasing our recent project – Flexera – a software asset and cloud management organization. Read how we overcame the challenges that came along together and the solutions the AC team delivered that made this migration smooth and effective.

Reasons Why You Should Migrate from Khoros to Salesforce

Migrating from Khoros to Salesforce often seems like a hard experience but the results you may get in the long run outweigh. Before we jump into the success story we achieved with Flexera, here are a few compelling reasons to make the move: while Khoros requires a substantial investment, Khoros’ users have to upgrade their communities to a newer version – Aurora – which means transferring heaps of data, users, posts, etc. This may lead to data loss and other mishaps.

Typical Challenges in Khoros to Salesforce Migration: Flexera Use Case 

The global enterprise turned to Advanced Communities to migrate two of its existing communities – Flexera and Revenera – from Khoros to Salesforce. The main objectives were to have a single platform, provide additional flexibility, and preserve all the historical data and functionality. Comb through the challenges migrating from Khoros to Salesforce you might also face based on Flexera’s use case:

Exported Data Format

Data exported from Khoros communities can sometimes be difficult to understand. This can make it tricky to transfer this data smoothly into Salesforce. For instance, you might encounter inconsistencies or inaccurate information in your exported data. This can lead to extra challenges during the migration process.

Data Structure Compatibility

Khoros and Salesforce store data very differently. For Flexera, the Advanced Communities team has migrated two community forums, involving blog posts and user data, and carefully restructured everything to match Salesforce’s structure. We managed to keep the object’s relationships and metadata.

Data Volume and Complexity

Khoros communities typically host great volumes of historical data. This data might span user interactions, content contributions, and community history. Migrating this data without loss or corruption was a major focus of the Flexera project for Advanced Communities.

Custom Functionality

Generally, Khoros communities are based on custom features that are not natively available in Salesforce. To migrate a community to Salesforce, it’s vital to understand business goals and user needs. This is exactly what Advanced Communities has done for Flexera. 

In the screenshot, you see the Flexera community homepage designed by the Advanced Communities team.

As seen in the screenshot, there is the Revenera community home page which was fully designed and implemented by Advanced Communities. It contains a custom Announcement component that is easily configurable by an Admin and displays up to 3 important announcements with the ability to add links. 

User Authentication and Single Sign-On (SSO)

Another challenge was to ensure security for users. To achieve this, we implemented Single Sign-On capabilities for a seamless login experience to allow access to different Salesforce communities.

Salesforce Platform Limitations

Salesforce is a powerful and robust platform with a wide range of functionalities. Even though, it has limitations. For instance, Chatter posts are quite strict in terms of allowed HTML tags for posts formatting and have a limit of 10,000 characters. These limitations required careful planning to ensure they were accounted for, without disrupting user engagement.

Navigating the Khoros to Salesforce Migration: Insights from Our Own Experience

To give you a headstart in your migration from Khoros to Salesforce, there are the steps we’ve taken with the Flexera project – you may take them as a basis for your process:

1. Assessments Before Migration

First, we did a deep dive into the Khoros setup and figured out how all the data, features, and customizations would fit into Salesforce.

2. Data Transformation 

The AC team used scripts and automated tools to transform Khoros data into a format that’s compatible with Salesforce. This process involved making sure the data was accurate and all relationships were checked.

As led by Flexera’s project example, Advanced Communities have used a set of native Salesforce Experience Cloud features for migrated Khoros communities:

• Salesforce Chatter – feed with questions & best answers, etc;
• Chatter Groups;
• Knowledge articles;
• Data Categories;
• Topics for knowledge base articles;
• Gamification – Badges, Missions, Levels, Points, and Leaderboard;

For instance, there are Flexera and Revenera knowledge bases: the AC team migrated all the articles, categorization, and related data (though the pages weren’t built by us):

3. Feature Migration 

Essential features from Khoros were rebuilt in Salesforce, including tailored components for announcements, user badges, and knowledge base topic management. For instance, we delivered point recalculation for community users after migration, did a cleansing of HTML tags, and rethought the posts & comments hierarchy. 

4. User Authentication

We implemented a Single Sign-On to make logging into two communities – Flexera and Revenera – super easy for users.

5. Staging and Testing

We tested the migration out in a staging environment to find and fix any data or functionality problems before going live.

What Results Were Achieved in Khoros to Salesforce Migration?

Check out the results that Advanced Communities delivered, migrating two large communities from Khoros to Salesforce Experience Cloud:  

• Seamless data integration: all historical data from Khoros was successfully migrated without loss.
• Improved user experience: the new communities feature a modern interface and intuitive navigation which makes it easier for users to engage.
• Enhanced scalability: built on Salesforce, the communities are now ready to grow with the client’s business needs.
• Streamlined access: a unified login via SSO simplifies user access across both communities.

Need Assistance Migrating from Khoros to Salesforce Experience Cloud? 

Advanced Communities specializes in Salesforce migration services and offers native-to-Salesforce apps perfect for building user-friendly communities. Contact us for further details and our professional team will help you migrate from Khoros to Salesforce Experience Cloud with ease, preserving your business goals and expanding your bottom line.