Does Salesforce for Outlook Work on a Mac?

Does Salesforce for Outlook work on a Mac? The short answer is “no”. But don’t leave this blog post yet because Mac users have an awesome solution.

What is Salesforce for Outlook?

The Salesforce website explains it best. “Salesforce for Outlook is a Microsoft® Outlook® integration application that you install, syncs contacts, events, and tasks between Outlook and Salesforce. In addition to syncing these items, you can add Outlook emails, attachments, events, and tasks to multiple Salesforce contacts, and view Salesforce records related to the contacts and leads in your emails and events—all directly in Outlook.”

Almost every Salesforce related implementation project has a requirement for us to configure “Salesforce for Outlook“. When users integrate Salesforce and Outlook together the user has the option to interact with Salesforce from their Microsoft Outlook client by utilizing the side panel that gets installed into your Outlook instance.

Why Doesn’t Salesforce for Outlook Work on a Mac?

The reason Salesforce for Outlook does not work on a Mac is because the Microsoft Outlook for Mac currently has no ad-on framework built into it. This means that it does not allow the installation of Salesforce for Outlook. So this lack of capability is not due to Salesforce but rather to Microsoft. So far Microsoft has indicated it does not have plans to make an add-on framework available for the Microsoft Outlook for Mac but hopefully the recent Salesforce and Microsoft partnership will bring Salesforce for Outlook to Mac users.

How Mac Users Can Integrate Salesforce for Outlook

As of the publication of this blog post a mac user cannot utilize the Salesforce for Outlook capability from Salesforce. But with a third-party app off the Salesforce AppExchanage Mac users would be able to obtain this capability. In our opinion the best Salesforce for Outlook app for Mac users is the Cirrus Insight for Outlook. (You can find information about the app too from the Salesforce AppExchange website.) Cirrus Insight for Outlook is $19/month/user (when paid annually) but it has a free trial associated with. Don’t wince yet over the cost because the app alone far exceeds the Salesforce for Outlook Connector (which is free with a Salesforce license). As a matter of fact, many of our clients who use Salesforce for Outlook on PCs end up switching to Cirrus Insight for Outlook because they want the capabilities that their Mac-using colleagues have.