Business Analyst
The Salesforce Certified Business Analyst credential is different from most Salesforce certifications. It does not test Salesforce feature configuration. It tests business analysis craft applied on a Salesforce project. You need to know how to run discovery, facilitate stakeholder sessions, write good user stories, map processes, and support UAT. If you have been doing the BA job on a Salesforce team, this exam should feel like a validation of the work you already do every day.
3-Step Path to Passing
- 1
Complete the Business Analyst Trailmix
Salesforce's official trailmix is well-structured and covers all six exam topics. The Cert Prep module at the end includes practice quizzes per topic. Work through it in order, and do not skip the agile and version-control modules even if they feel tangential. - 2
Attempt Practice Exams
I recommend my own practice exams, but I have linked other options in the Study Resources section below. This exam is heavy on scenario questions, so the best prep is working through realistic scenarios and understanding why the BA-correct answer beats the Salesforce-correct distractor. - 3Exams run every day, at all hours of the day. There is no need to schedule your exam far in advance. Schedule when you feel ready after consistently scoring above 75% on practice exams.
Core Resources
Exam Overview
Questions
65
60 scored + 5 unscored
Duration
105 min
1 hour 45 minutes
To Pass
65%
Minimum Score
Question Format
Scored
92%60questions
Unscored
8%5questions
Exam Details
Pricing
$200 registration · $100 retake
Delivery
Online proctored or at a testing center
Experience
None (role experience as a BA recommended)
Prerequisites
No prerequisites required
Exam Topics
Each topic section shows the topic weight, learning objectives, and links to study resources.
Customer Discovery17%
BA role and responsibilities in the implementation lifecycle, business strategy and goal alignment, current-state analysis, Salesforce capability mapping, and project scoping.
- Determine business strategies, goals, initiatives, and challenges to define the scope of a Salesforce project or business initiative.
- Discover how a customer is leveraging existing products to establish the current state.
- Understand and explain Business Analyst roles and responsibilities in different phases of the implementation lifecycle.
- Apply the implementation lifecycle for planning business analysis activities.
- Analyze the customer's Salesforce environment(s) to identify opportunities and constraints.
- Demonstrate knowledge of Salesforce capabilities, align them with business needs, and recommend potential solutions.
Resources
Collaboration with Stakeholders23%
Stakeholder identification and RACI planning, discovery activity design, elicitation techniques (interviews, workshops, surveys, observation, document analysis), trusted-advisor relationship building, current-to-future-state design, and consensus management.
- Plan discovery activities based on the target stakeholders to perform a thorough analysis of business needs.
- Identify key stakeholders and develop relationships with them as a trusted advisor to act as a liaison between business and technical teams.
- Given a scenario, choose the most effective technique for eliciting business needs from stakeholders.
- Explain how to move from current state analysis to an agreed future state design.
- Given a scenario, manage competing priorities to obtain stakeholder consensus.
Resources
Business Process Mapping12%
Process decomposition and scope definition, UPN and swimlane diagram notation, current-to-future state documentation, version-controlled process repositories, and stakeholder visualization techniques.
- Demonstrate how to define the scope of a complex business process and break it down into manageable steps.
- Analyze and document a business process to elicit requirements and engage stakeholders to visualize a future state.
- Document business processes in a version controlled repository to manage scope.
Resources
Requirements18%
Business, functional, and non-functional requirements distinctions, scope vs. requirements vs. user stories, stakeholder identification and prioritization, requirements validation, traceability, and version-controlled documentation.
- Understand the differences between scope, requirements and user stories.
- Engage stakeholders to identify, validate, and prioritize requirements.
- Document requirements in a version controlled repository to manage scope.
Resources
User Stories18%
User story format and components, acceptance criteria (Given/When/Then), Definition of Done, epics vs. features vs. stories vs. tasks, story granularity and splitting, and version-controlled story repositories.
- Understand the components of a user story to perform thorough analysis.
- Demonstrate how to write acceptance criteria that convey the requirements and are ready for development.
- Document user stories in a version controlled repository to manage scope.
Resources
Development Support and User Acceptance12%
BA's role in sprint delivery and demos, UAT planning and execution, defect triage vs. change requests, test script creation, sign-off facilitation, and release readiness.
- Support and validate project delivery to ensure the solution meets the requirements.
- Support and validate user acceptance testing (UAT) to ensure the solution meets the requirements.
Resources
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